PITT  FESSENDENM 


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Division 
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Shelf. 
Received 


University  of  California. 


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U.S>. 


MEMORIAL  ADDRESSES 


LIFE    AND    CHARACTER 


WILLIAM    PITT    FESSENDEN, 

(A  SENATOR  FROM  MAINE,) 


DELIVERED  IN  THE 


41ST  CONQRESS,  SD  SESSION, 


DECEMBER    14,   1869. 


PUBLISHED  BY  OEUEE  OF  CONGRESS. 


WASHINGTON: 

GOVERNMENT    PRINTING    OFFICE, 

1870. 


LIBRARY 

UNIVERSITY   OF 

CALIFORNIA. 


WILLIAM  PITT  FESSEKDEN. 


PROCEEDINGS  IN  THE  SENATE. 


PRAYER  BY  THE  CHAPLAIN,  REV.  J.  P.  NEWMAN,  D.D. 

Lord,  Thou  hast  been  our  dwelling-place  in  all  genera 
tions.  Before  the  mountains  were  brought  forth,  or  ever 
Thou  hadst  formed  the  earth  and  the  world,  even  from  ever 
lasting  to  everlasting,  Thou  art  God.  Older  than  the  earth, 
older  than  the  stars,  older  than  the  angels,  Thou  art  God 
eternal  and  blessed  forevermore.  But  upon  all  things  earthly 
is  impressed  vanity,  and  we  deplore  the  sin  which  has 
doomed  us  to  sorrow  and  to  death.  Empires  pass  away, 
and  humanity,  generation  after  generation,  is  carried  to  the 
charnel-house  of  departed  ages.  But  we  return  Thee  hearty 
thanks,  gracious  God,  that,  notwithstanding  this  general 
doom,  the  noble  and  the  immortal  part  of  man  shall  sur 
vive  the  tomb.  We  return  Thee  thanks  for  all  that  was 
great  in  intellect  and  noble  in  heart  and  philanthropic  in 
life,  for  all  that  was  patriotic  and  loyal  in  the  public  services, 
of  him  whose  memory  shall  be  commemorated  to-day.  And 
grant  that  by  this  dispensation  of  Thy  providence  these 
Senators  may  grow  wise;  that  they  may  so  live  and  so  die 
that  their  lives  shall  be  their  eulogy;  that  in  their  death 
the  people  shall  rise  up  and  call  them  blessed;  and  that 
God  may  pronounce  His  benediction  upon  their  eternity. 
Regard  in  Thy  tender  mercy  those  who  were  near  and  dear  to 
the  departed.  May  they  be  infolded  in  the  arms  of  Thine  affec 
tion  and  protection.  Command  Thy  blessing  upon  Thy  servant, 


REMARKS   OF   ME.   MOERILL   ON 


the  President  of  this  Bepublic ;  upon  Thy  servant  who  pre 
sides  here;  upon  these  Senators;  upon  all  that  are  in  authority; 
and  upon  the  whole  nation ;  for  Jesus'  sake.  Ainen. 


REMARKS    BY    MR.  MORRILL,   OF  MAINE. 

Mr.  President:  One  who  at  your  adjournment  in  April  had 
in  this  Chamber  become  a  familiar  presence,  a  pervading 
influence,  comes  not  again  at  your  reassembling  in  Decem 
ber.  The  dull  toll  of  far-off  bells,  the  visible  emblems  of 
mourning,  public  and  private,  have  spoken  of  bereavement, 
and  touch  our  hearts  with  deepest  sensibility. 

These  swiftly-repeating  vicissitudes  in  the  personal  desti 
nies  of  those  associated  here;  a  consciousness  of  the  num 
bers  of  the  wise,  the  patriotic,  the  trusted,  who  of  late  have 
departed  hence — who  come  no  more  to  these  councils — op 
press  as  with  the  weight  of  a  common  misfortune;  and  now 
a  new  absence  at  the  roll-call  to  earthly  duty  inflicts  a  fresh 
pang  of  regret.  A  great  public  sorrow  afflicts  the  people  of 
my  State — a  sense  of  bereavement  the  nation.  In  especial 
sympathy  with  the  common  misfortune  the  Senate  pauses  to 
pay  its  tribute  of  respect  to  its  eminent  dead,  the  marked 
lineaments  of  whose  form  and  character  are  vivid  still  in 
the  memory,  who  so  lately  stood  here  in  his  high  office,  in 
the  prominence  of  native  gifts  and  of  a  rich  and  varied 
experience,  challenging  the  respect,  the  confidence,  and  the 
admiration  of  his  countrymen. 

On  the  8th  day  of  September  last,  after  a  career  pre-emi 
nent  in  professional  and  public  life,  beginning  with  his  earliest 
manhood,  and  having  been  constantly  associated  with  the 
courts,  and  officially  in  the  public  councils  of  the  State  and 
nation,  at  the  zenith  of  his  fame  and  in  the  full  possession 
of  his  intellectual  faculties,  William  Pitt  Fesscnden  was  called 
away  from  the  scenes  of  earth. 


WILLIAM   PITT    FESSENDEN. 


The  public  career  of  Mr.  Fessendeu  was  not  in  any  sense 
problematical;  and  in  this  presence,  a  witness  to  so  consid 
erable  a  portion  of  it,  and  in  its  just  prominence,  so  inti 
mately  associated  with  the  great  events  of  our  more  recent 
history,  analysis  of  it  would  seem  to  be  quite  needless; 
while  properly  to  other  hands  and  other  occasions  it  may 
be  left  adequately  to  portray  those  marked  elements  of  his 
character  from  which  sprang  his  public  eminence. 

His  years  of  activity  were  divided  between  public  and  pro 
fessional  life,  to  the  latter  of  which  in  early  years  he  consecra 
ted  himself  with  singular  fidelity,  his  passionate  fondness  for  it 
remaining  long  after  the  exigencies  of  the  public  service  had 
severed  all  practical  connection  with  it.  While  the  former  was 
not  wholly  uninterrupted  and  exclusive,  it  was  sufficiently  con 
tinuous  and  devoted  for  contact,  connection,  and  familiarity 
with  the  politics  and  public  events  of  the  day. 

Entering  the  legislature  of  his  State  at  twenty-six,  he  was 
returned  at  short  intervals,  was  early  a  member  of  Congress, 
again  in  the  legislature,  then  advancing  to  this  body,  then, 
briefly,  minister  of  state,  and  finally  again  in  the  Senate, 
where  it  may  not  unfitly  be  said  his  service  was  continuous 
from  its  first  beginning  to  its  final  close. 

His  early  advent  into  the  legislature  of  his  State  was  notice 
able  for  the  concession  of  the  party  in  power  to  his  eloquence 
and  acquirements,  of  positions  of  distinction  and  influence 
which  by  usage  belonged  to  political  friends,  to  riper  years, 
and  larger  experience. 

On  his  entrance  into  the  national  House  of  Eepresentatives, 
himself  among  the  youngest  of  its  members,  he  at  once  partici 
pated  in  the  important  debates  of  that  body,  attracting  notice 
as  a  graceful  orator  and  skillful  debater,  and  for  the  compre 
hension  and  maturity  of  his  opinions. 

His  pre-eminent  public  career  dates,  strictly,  from  his  en 
trance  into  this  body  in  1854.  as  from  this  time  he  gave  himself 
exclusively  to  his  public  duties. 


REMARKS    OF   MR.    MORRILL    ON 


Simultaneously  with  his  advent  to  the  Senate  arose  in  Con 
gress  that  class  of  public  questions  which  wrere  calculated  to 
test  the  temper  of  his  affections,  the  tenacity  of  his  opinions, 
and  the  steadiness  of  his  purpose.  Kansas-Nebraska,  the 
stalking-horse  of  slavery,  which  under  an  affectation  of  de 
fending  the  Constitution  was  to  conceal  the  guilty  purpose  of 
subversion  of  democratic  republican  institutions,  afforded  an 
opportunity  for  the  exhibition  of  those  powers  of  analysis, 
logic,  and  invective  which  have  rarely  been  surpassed  in  any 
legislative  body.  Here  was  audacious  menace,  significant  hint 
to  overt  treason  which  was  to  follow ;  here  were  the  first  mut- 
terings  of  the  storm  that  was  to  burst  upon  the  nation  amid 
the  convulsions  of  civil  war.  This  audacious  spirit  of  bad  faith, 
usurpation,  and  oppression,  leading  an  assault  upon  popular 
rights,  could  not  fail  to  provoke  the  intensest  hostility  in  one, 
the  very  elements  of  whose  being  made  him  intolerant  of  every 
species  of  infidelity,  violence,  and  cruelty. 

The  effect  here  of  his  memorable  speech  on  that  occasion 
was  electric,  and  contributed,  it  may  not  be  doubted,  to  swell 
the  tide  of  popular  indignation  and  resolution  of  the  great 
national  uprising  of  1856,  followed  in  after  years  by  memorable 
deeds  in  arms. 

Not  aggressive  in  spirit,  not  an  advanced  radical  reformer 
even,  whatever  may  be  said  of  his  constitutional  conservatism, 
he  was,  by  the  native  simplicity  of  his  tastes,  his  education 
and  habits  of  life,  and  better  still,  by  his  enlightened  sense  of 
justice  and  hatred  of  wrong,  always  the  able  and  fearless  advo 
cate  of  civil  and  religious  liberty.  Eepublican  institutions  had 
no  truer  conservator  and  oppression  no  more  determined  and 
uncompromising  opponent  than  William  Pitt  Fessenden. 

From  this  time  forward  to  the  close  his  views  were  given 
upon  most  questions  of  importance,  and  his  influence  upon  the 
legislation  and  policy  of  the  country  during  its  eventful  strug 
gle  of  civil  war  was  conspicuous.  Internal  revenue,  the  cur 
rency,  the  banking  system,  and  finally  reconstruction,  all 


WILLIAM    PITT    FESSENDEN. 


received  the  touch  of  his  hand  and  the  influence  of  his 
genius. 

In  sentiment  Mr.  Fessenden  was  thoroughly  anti-slavery. 
It  was  his  inheritance,  and  through  life  he  was  faithful  to  it. 
In  all  the  attempts  of  slavery  for  recognition  and  protection 
his  opposition  was  inflexible.  When  to  be  anti-slavery  was  to 
be  anti- American,  he  was  anti-slavery;  when  his  party  would 
compromise,  he  dissented  5  when  repeal  was  demanded  in  its 
interest,  he  protested;  when,  later,  on  the  eve  of  rebellion, 
conference  and  concession  were  proposed,  he  would  have  no 
participation  in  it,  and  would  yield  no  assent;  and  when  war 
came  for  separation  and  independent  slave  power,  he  saw  in  it 
the  nation's  opportunity ;  and  that  initial  measure  for  universal 
emancipation — abolition  of  slavery  in  the  national  capital — 
had  his  approval  and  support.  The  abolition  of  slavery  here 
he  declared  was  a  "measure  that  had  ever  been  dear  to  his 
heart;"  and  later,  on  a  kindred  question,  he  said:  "I  tell  the 
President  from  my  place  here  as  Senator,  and  I  tell  the  gen 
erals  of  the  army,  that  they  must  reverse  their  practice  of  re 
turning  fugitive  slaves  who  come  within  our  lines." 

The  lineaments  of  Mr.  Fessenden's  character  were  marked 
and  clear.  He  was  endowed  with  an  acute  understanding, 
lively  sensibility,  and  intense  personality  and  self-reliance. 
Penetration  and  insight  eminently  characterized  his  genius. 
He  was  through  with  his  preparatory  course,  had  graduated 
from  college,  studied  his  profession  and  entered  upon  its  prac 
tice,  and  had  gained  distinction  in  the  departments  of  law  and 
legislation  at  an  age  when  most  minds  are  just  beginning  to 
contemplate  their  intricacies  and  ascend  their  rugged  steeps. 

There  was  next  to  nothing  in  his  life,  public  or  private, 
which  was  factitious  or  artificial.  His  professional  success 
and  his  influence  in  State  and  national  legislation  were  by  no 
accident,  nor  by  the  employment  of  adventitious  supports,  but 
by  the  inherent  energy  and  force  of  his  mental  constitution. 
He  was  eminent  in  his  profession,  as  in  him  were  combined 


8 


REMARKS    OF   ME.    MORE  ILL    ON 


those  intellectual  faculties  and  mental  habits  which  go  to 
make  the  lawyer,  the  statesman,  and  the  public  administrator. 
Had  he  possessed  more  sentiment  and  imagination  and  greater 
enthusiasm  for  the  ideal,  it  would  doubtless  have  increased  his 
popularity,  while  it  may  be  questioned  if  his  reliability  as  a 
citizen,  his  distinction  as  a  lawyer,  or  his  eminence  as  legis 
lator,  would  have  been  greater. 

In  him  the  intensely  practical  ever  so  asserted  its  prepond 
erance  over  the  ideal  in  action  as  to  present  to  superficial 
observance  a  lack  of  the  finer  sensibilities.  He  did  nothing 
from  impulse,  and  on  the  most  exciting  occasions  could  be  cool 
and  free  from  irrepressible  restlessness;  but  it  was  the  calm  of 
high  resolve,  persistent  and  tenacious,  in  its  triumph  over 
passion  and  sentiment.  He  was  nevertheless  susceptible  to 
the  gentler  influences;  a  most  genial  companion,  gentle,  ten 
der,  and  affectionate  in  his  family,  and  had  delight  in  the 
elegant  arts— sculpture,  painting,  and  poetry. 

Mr.  Fessenden  was  not  a  theorist;  the  visions  of  abstract 
speculation  did  not  inspire  him  with  confidence.  He  saw 
passing  events  as  it  were  in  the  retrospect,  and  was  little 
affected  by  the  factitious  circumstances  and  excitements  of  the 
moment.  He  was  not  especially  deferential  to  the  authority  of 
precedent  or  tradition,  nor  readily  attracted  by  novelties  or 
specious  pretenses  of  reform,  and  fearlessly  applied  to  all 
propositions  for  his  action  or  assent  the  rigor  of  his  accus 
tomed  methods  of  induction  and  analysis. 

His  character  rested  on  a  granite  basis,  and  sustained  the 
structure  of  a  lofty  public  virtue  and  private  integrity,  while 
an  inflexible  personal  independence  kept  guard  over  the  intel 
lect  and  conscience,  and  challenged  the  advance  alike  of  friend 
and  foe  to  this  seat  of  his  power  and  secret  of  his  success.  It 
would  have  been  impossible  for  him,  like  his  great  namesake, 
the  premier  of  George  IIIr  to  recover  office,  to  acquire  or  retain 
place  or  power,  by  a  concession  of  his  principles  or  of  a  point 
of  honor.  No  public  man  ever  more  heroically  followed  the 


WILLIAM    PITT    FESSENDEiSr.  9 

leadership  of  his  reason  and  judgment,  and  with  a  loftier  dis 
dain  of  inferior  guidance. 

His  mind  and  method  were  of  the  judicial  order.  He  did 
not  defer  to  the  decision  of  the  popular  judgment  as  the  sum 
of  political  wisdom  and  the  inevitable  law  of  duty.  His  own 
and  not  the  public  sense  was  his  rule  of  action  as  a  Senator. 
He  paid  little  court  to  the  people,  and  practiced  no  artifices 
and  employed  no  gratuities  to  enlist  them  in  his  interests  or 
purposes.  And  he  did  not  sway  the  masses  so  much  by  the 
sublimity  of  his  sentiments  as  he  inspired  confidence  and 
admiration  by  the  dignity  of  his  manners,  the  clearness  of 
his  understanding,  and  the  purity  of  his  life. 

That  he  possessed  ambition  was  doubtless  true,  while 
equally  true  it  was  that  he  was  free  from  all  suspicion  that 
his  ambition  had  overcome  his  judgment  or  betrayed  his 
public  virtue.  He  had  little  ambition  for  mere  power,  and 
less  use  for  it.  Patronage  he  did  not  covet  or  employ 
as  a  support;  nor  had  the  greed  of  gain,  nor  the  desire  of 
accumulation,  power  over  him  as  a  man,  a  citizen,  or  public 
servant. 

If  excellence  in  oratory  is  to  be  determined  by  its  instant 
effect,  Mr.  Fesseuden  was  in  this  entitled  to  high  rank.  His 
style  was  clear  and  close;  his  reasoning  concise;  his  language 
simple  and  natural;  his  sarcasm  keen  and  pungent.  His 
speeches  were  calculated  and  designed  for  present  effect,  and 
never  seem  to  have  been  elaborated  with  a  view  to  their 
appearance  in  print.  Taken  by  no  sudden  impulse,  poised  in 
debate  on  his  intellect  and  reason,  he  was  never  vehement, 
rarely  yielding  to  strong  emotions,  and  only  when  pressed 
by  antagonism  strongly  assailing  his  convictions  or  impinging 
his  personal  independence.  On  such  occasions  he  exhibited 
the  amplitude  of  his  powers  and  the  intensity  of  his  nature. 

Skepticism  and  infidelity  were  foreign  to  his  mental  consti 
tution.  Thoughtful  and  sincere,  with  characteristic  independ 
ence  of  creeds  and  traditions,  his  was  a  nature  to  feel  the 


HEMARKS    OF    ME.   STJMNER   ON 


religious  sentiment  strongest  as  it  dwells  apart  in  the  silence  of 
the  soul.  In  his  recent  touching  eulogy  here  of  his  cherished 
friend,  with  whom  he  had  long.  been  associated,  are  to  be 
found  utterances  of  his  profound  faith  in  God  and  of  the 
Christian's  hope  of  endless  and  more  exalted  life. 

Among  the  distinguished  characters  who  shall  illustrate  the 
annals  of  our  times  history  will  assign  William  Pitt  Fessenden 
a  conspicuous  place.  Through  all  his  public  life  and  services 
there  shines  the  luster  of  a  gifted  and  noble  manhood,  of  a 
tried  patriotism,  and  of  disinterested  devotion  to  worthy  ends 
and  aims.  A  steady  leader,  a  safe  counselor,  a  pure  and  con 
siderate  patriot,  an  eminent  statesman,  a  true  man  and  friend, 
has  gone  to  his  reward. 

Mr.  President,  I  submit  the  following  resolutions: 

Resolved,  That  the  Senate  receive  with  deep  regret  the  announcement  of 
the  death  of  William  Pitt  Fesseuden,  late  a  member  of  this  body. 

Resolved,  That  the  members  of  the  Senate  will  manifest  their  respect  for 
the  memory  of  the  deceased  by  wearing  the  usual  badge  of  mourning. 

Resolved,  That  these  proceedings  be  communicated  to  the  House  of  Rep 
resentatives. 


REMARKS  BY  MR.  SUMNER,    OF  MASSACHUSETTS. 

Mr.  President :  A  seat  in  this  Chamber  is  vacant.  But  this 
is  a  very  inadequate  expression  for  the  present  occasion.  Much 
more  than  a  seat  is  vacant.  There  is  a  void  difficult  to  measure, 
as  it  will  be  difficult  to  fill.  Always  eminent  from  the  begin 
ning,  Mr.  Fesseuden  during  these  latter  years  became  so  large 
a  part  of  the  Senate,  that  without  him  it  seems  to  be  a  different 
body.  His  guiding  judgment,  his  ready  power,  his  presence  so 
conspicuous  in  debate,  are  gone,  taking  away  from  this  Cham 
ber  that  identity  which  it  received  so  considerably  from  him. 

Of  all  the  present  Senate  one  only  besides  myself  witnessed 
his  entry  into  this  Chamber.  I  can  not  forget  it.  He  came  in 
the  midst  of  that  terrible  debate  on  the  Kansas  and  Nebraska 


WILLIAM   PITT   FESSENDEN. 


bill  by  which  the  country  was  convulsed  to  its  center,  and  his 
arrival  had  the  effect  of  a  re-enforcement  on  a  field  of  battle. 
Those  who  stood  for  Freedom  then  were  few  in  numbers  —  not 
more  than  fourteen,  while  thirty-seven  Senators  in  solid  column 
voted  to  break  the  faith  originally  plighted  to  Freedom  and  to 
overturn  a  time-honored  landmark,  opening  that  vast  Mesopo- 
tamian  region  to  tbe  curse  of  Slavery.  Those  anxious  days 
are  with  difficulty  comprehended  by  a  Senate  where  Freedom 
rules.  One  more  in  our  small  number  was  a  sensible  addition. 
We  were  no  longer  fourteen,  but  fifteen.  His  reputation  at  the 
bar,  and  his  fame  in  the  other  House  gave  assurance  which 
was  promptly  sustained.  He  did  not  wait,  but  at  once  entered 
into  the  debate  with  all  those  resources  which  afterwards 
became  so  famous.-  The  scene  that  ensued  exhibited  his  readi 
ness  and  courage.  While  saying  that  the  people  of  the  North 
were  fatigued  with  the  threat  of  disunion  —  -that  they  consid 
ered  it  as  "  mere  noise  and  nothing  else,"  he  was  interrupted 
by  Mr.  Butler,  of  South  Carolina,  always  ready  to  speak  for 
Slavery,  exclaiming,  "  If  such  sentiments  as  yours  prevail  I 
want  a  dissolution  right  away"  —  a  characteristic  intrusion 
doubly  out  of  order  —  to  which  the  new-comer  rejoined,  "  Do 
not  delay  it  on  my  account;  do  not  delay  it  on  account  of  any 
body  at  the  North."  The  effect  was  electric;  but  this  incident 
was  not  alone.  Douglas,  Cass,  and  Butler  interrupted  only 
to  be  worsted  by  one  who  had  just  ridden  into  the  lists.  The 
feelings  of  the  other  side  were  expressed  by  the  Senator  from 
South  Carolina,  who  after  one  of  the  flashes  of  debate  which 
he  had  provoked  exclaimed  :  "  Very  well,  go  on  ;  I  have  no 
hope  of  you."  All  this  will  be  found  in  the  Globe,  precisely 
as  I  give  it,  but  the  Globe  could  not  picture  the  exciting 
scene  —  the  Senator  from  Maine  erect,  firm,  immovable  as  a 
jutting  promontory  against  which  the  waves  of  ocean  tossed 
and  broke  in  dissolving  spray.  There  he  stood.  Not  a  Sena 
tor,  loving  Freedom,  who  did  not  feel  on  that  day  that  a 
champion  had  come. 


12  REMAKES   OF    Mil.    SUMNER   ON 

This  scene  so  brilliant  in  character,  illustrates  Mr.  Fessen- 
den's  long  career  in  the  Senate.  All  present  were  moved, 
while  those  at  a  distance  were  less  affected.  His  speech, 
which  was  argumentative,  direct,  and  pungent,  exerted  more 
influence  on  those  who  heard  it  than  on  those  who  only  read 
it,  vindicating  his  place  as  debater  rather  than  orator.  This 
place  he  held  to  the  end  without  a  superior — without  a  peer. 
Nobody  could  match  him  in  immediate  and  incisive  reply. 
His  words  were  swift,  and  sharp  as  a  cimeter,  or,  borrowing 
an  illustration  from  an  opposite  quarter,  he  "shot  flying"  and 
with  unerring  aim.  But  while  this  great  talent  secured  for 
him  always  the  first  honors  of  debate,  it  was  les.i  important 
with  the  country,  which,  except  in  rare  instances,  is  more  im 
pressed  by  ideas  and  by  those  forms  in  which  truth  is  manifest. 

The  Senate  has  changed  much  from  its  original  character, 
when,  shortly  after  the  formation  of  the  National  Government, 
a  Nova  Scotia  paper,  in  a  passage  copied  by  one  of  our  own 
journals,  while  declaring  that  the  habits  of  the  people  here 
are  very  favorable  to  oratory,  could  say,  "There  is  but  one 
assembly  in  the  whole  range  of  the  Federal  Union  in 
which  oratory  is  deemed  unnecessary,  and,  I  believe,  even 
absurd  and  obtrusive,  to  wit,  the  Senate,  or  upper  house  of 
Congress.  They  are  merely  a  deliberative  meeting,  in  which 
every  man  delivers  his  concise  opinion,  one  leg  over  the  other, 
as  they  did  in  the  first  Congress,  when  an  harangue  was  a 
great  rarity."  [United  States  Gazette,  Philadelphia,  December 
31,  1789.]  Speech  was,  then,  for  business  and  immediate 
effect  in  the  Chamber.  Since  then  the  transformation  has 
proceeded — speech  becoming  constantly  more  important — until 
now,  without  neglect  of  business,  the  Senate  has  become  a 
center  from  which  to  address  the  country.  A  seat  here  is  a 
lofty  pulpit  with  a  mighty  sounding-board,  and  the  whole 
wide- spread  people  is  the  congregation. 

As  Mr.  Fessenden  rarely  spoke  except  for  business,  what  he 
said  was  restrained  in  its  influence,  but  it  was  most  effective 


WILLIAM   PITT    FESSENDEN.  ]_3 

in  this  Chamber.  Here  was  his  empire  arid  his  undisputed 
throne.  Of  perfect  integrity  and  austerest  virtue,  he  was 
inaccessible  to  those  temptations  which  in  various  forms  beset 
the  avenues  of  public  life.  Most  faithfully  and  constantly  did 
he  watch  the  interests  intrusted  to  him.  Here  he  was  a  model. 
Holding  the  position  of  chairman  of  the  Finance  Committee, 
while  it  yet  had  those  double  duties  which  are  now  divided 
between  two  important  committees,  he  became  the  guardian 
of  the  national  treasury,  both  in  its  receipts  and  its  expendi 
tures,  so  that  nothing  was  added  to  it  or  taken  from  it  without 
his  knowledge,  and  how  truly  he  discharged  this  immense 
trust  all  will  attest.  Nothing  could  leave  the  Treasury  with 
out  showing  a  passport.  This  service  was  the  more  momentous 
from  the  magnitude  of  the  transactions  involved,  for  it  was 
during  the  whole  period  of  the  war,  when  appropriations 
responded  to  loans  and  taxes — all  being  on  a  scale  beyond 
precedent  in  the  world's  history.  On  these  questions,  some 
times  so  sensitive  and  difficult  and  always  so  grave,  his 
influence  was  beyond  that  of  any  other  Senator  and  constantly 
swayed  the  Senate.  All  that  our  best  generals  were  in  arms 
he  was  in  the  financial  field. 

Absorbed  in  his  great  duties  and  confined  too  much  by  the 
training  of  a  profession  which  too  often  makes  its  follower 
slave  where  he  is  not  master,  he  forgot  sometimes  that  cham 
pionship  which  shone  so  brightly  when  he  first  entered  the 
Senate.  Ill -health  came  with  its  disturbing  influence,  and, 
without  any  of  the  nature  of  Hamlet,  his  conduct  at  times 
suggested  those  words  by  which  Hamlet  pictures  the  short 
comings  of  life.  Too  often,  in  his  case,  "the  native  hue  of 
resolution  was  sicklied  o'er  with  the  pale  cast  of  thought,"  and, 
perhaps,  I  might  follow  the  words  of  Shakespeare  further,  and 
picture  "enterprises  of  great  pith  and  moment,  which,  with 
this  regard,  their  current  turned  awry  and  lost  the  name  of 
action." 

Men  are  tempted  by  the  talent  which  they  possess,  and  he 


14  REMARKS   OF   MR.    TEUMBULL    ON 

could  not  resist  the  impulse  to  employ,  sometimes  out  of  place, 
those  extraordinary  powers  which  he  commanded  so  easily. 
More  penetrating  than  grasping,  he  easily  pierced  the  argu 
ment  of  his  opponent,  and,  once  engaged,  he  yielded  to  the 
excitement  of  the  moment  and  the  joy  of  conflict.  His  words 
warmed,  as  the  Olympic  wheel  caught  fire  in  the  swiftness  of 
the  race.  If,  on  these  occasions,  there  were  sparkles  which 
fell  where  they  should  not  have  fallen,  they  cannot  be  remem 
bered  now.  Were  he  still  among  us,  face  to  face,  it  were 
better  to  say,  in  the  words  01'  that  earliest  recorded  recon 
ciliation  : 

"Let  us  no  more  contend  nor  blame 
Each  other,  blamed  enough  elsewhere,  but  strive 
In  offices  of  love  how  we  may  lighten 
Each  other's  burden  in  our  share  of  woe." 

Error  and  frailty  checker  the  life  of  man.  If  this  were  not 
so  earth  would  be  heaven,  for  what  could  add  to  the  happiness 
of  life  free  from  error  or  frailty  ?  The  Senator  we  mourn  was 
human ;  but  the  error  and  frailty  which  belonged  to  him  often 
took  their  color  from,  virtue  itself.  On  these  he  needs  no 
silence,  even  if  the  grave  which  is  now  closing  over  him  did 
not  refuse  its  echoes  except  to  what  is  good. 


REMARKS    BY    MR.    TRUMBULL,    OF    ILLINOIS. 

Mr.  President :  While  these  last  rites  are  taking  place,  even 
though  unsolicited,  my  feelings  would  not  have  allowed  the 
occasion  to  pass  away  without  laying  upon  the  grave  of  our 
departed  brother  some  token  of  my  affection  and  regard ;  and 
though  the  flowers  I  bring  are  gathered  by  the  wayside,  they 
represent  a  love  and  a  respect  no  less  sincere  than  those  which 
have  been  more  skillfully  selected  and  arranged  for  the  occa 
sion.  Others  have  spoken,  and  truly,  of  the  loss  which  the 
Senate  and  the  nation  have  sustained  in  the  death  of  Mr. 


WILLIAM   PITT   FESSENDEX.  15 

Fessenden.  His  clear  intellect,  quick  perception,  and  incisive 
manner  of  speaking  gave  him  great  power  in  a  legislative 
body,  and  when  added,  to  these  are  purity  of  character,  spot 
less  integrity,  a  high  sense  of  honor,  together  with  love  of 
country  and  of  liberty,  you  have  the  useful  and  accomplished 
statesman,  and  such  was  Mr.  Fessenden.  As  a  debater,  en 
gaged  in  the  current  business  of  legislation,  the  Senate  has 
not  had  his  equal  in  my  time.  No  man  could  detect  a  soph 
istry  or  perceive  a  scheme  or  a  job  quicker  than  he,  and  none 
possessed  the  power  to  expose  it  more  effectually.  He  was  a 
practical,  matter-of-fact  man;  in  other  words,  a  business  man, 
utterly  abhorring  all  show,  pretension,  and  humbug.  He  was 
laborious,  careful,  and  painstaking;  punctual  and  attentive  to 
business,  understood  well  the  meaning  of  words,  and  was  pre 
cise  in  their  use. 

Being  a  practical  man  he  seldom  if  ever  made  what  are 
called  set  speeches  or  orations.  He  never  spoke  except  to  the 
question  before  the  Senate ;  and  in  controversies,  whether  with 
political  adversaries  or  in  regard  to  current  business,  he  had 
no  superior  in  the  body.  I  well  recollect  the  estimate  put 
upon  Mr.  Fessenden  as  a  well-informed  ready  debater  when  I 
first  came  to  the  Senate.  At  that  time  it  consisted  of  sixty- 
two  members,  of  whom  only  fifteen  were  republicans.  It  was 
a  time  of  high  party  excitement.  The  majority  were  domineer 
ing  and  often  offensive  to  members  of  the  minority.  They  con 
trolled  the  business  of  the  Senate  and  could  take  their  own 

» 
time  to  assail  minority  Senators  or  the  views  they  entertained, 

and  it  was  not  uncommon  for  members  of  the  dominant  party 
to  go  out  of  their  way  to  seek  controversies  with  and  assail 
certain  Senators  in  the  minority  less  practiced  in  debate  than 
themselves,  and  over  whom  they  supposed  they  could  obtain 
some  advantage;  but  they  never  sought  controversies  with 
Mr.  Fessenden,  and  when  a  debate  did  incidentally  spring  up 
between  him  and  some  political  opponent,  I  have  not  forgotten 
how  pleased  and  gratified  his  political  associates  were  that  the 


REMARKS    OF    Mil.    TRUMBULL    ON 


discussion  was  iii  the  hands  of  one  so  competent  to  maintain  it 
on  their  part. 

No  political  friend  ever  feared  the  result  of  a  discussion  of 
any  kind  in  which  Mr.  Fessenden  was  engaged.  The  period 
of  his  public  services  embraces  the  most  important  events 
which  have  occurred  in  our  nation's  history,  and  he  was  a 
prominent  actor  in  them  all.  Either  as  the  head  of  the  Finance 
Committee  of  this  body,  or  as  Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  he 
took  a  principal  part  in  originating,  maturing,  and  giving  prac 
tical  effect  to  that  financial  policy  which  furnished  the  sinews 
by  which  the  great  rebellion  was  crushed.  The  war  over,  he 
took  a  leading  part  in  the  difficult  work  of  restoring  order  to  a 
country  torn  asunder  by  four  years  of  remorseless  civil  war, 
and  was  especially  conspicuous  in  those  measures  which  we  all 
trust  are  soon  to  bring  into  harmonious  relations  all  the  States 
of  the  Union.  As  a  public  officer  and  a  Senator  he  was  scru 
pulously  careful  of  the  interests  and  the  honor  of  the  Govern 
ment.  So  zealous  was  he  in  this  respect,  and  so  little  patience 
had  he  with  any  attempt  to  take  advantage  of  the  Govern 
ment,  or  with  demagogism  or  shams  of  any  kind,  that  some 
attributed  to  him  an  austerity  and  irritability  which  did  not 
belong  to  him  as  a  man.  It  was  only  as  an  official  that  he 
sometimes  seemed  hard  and  austere.  As  an  individual  in  the 
private  walks  of  life  he  was  full  of  sympathy  and  kindness 
and  charity.  When  the  sad  tidings  of  his  death  flashed  across 
the  land,  its  public  men  and  we  who  were  his  associates  were 
not  the  only  ones  who  felt  the  shock,  but  it  fell  with  still 
heavier  force  on  many  an  obscure  and  lowly  one  who  had 
enjoyed  his  favor  and  been  the  recipient  of  his  unostentatious 
bounty.  In  the  discharge  of  public  duty  he  stood  erect,  un 
moved  alike  by  threats  of  vengeance  or  promises  of  favor. 
In  private  life  he  was  kind  and  gentle  and  obliging. 

But  I  did  not  rise  so  much  to  speak  of  the  great  abilities  and 
noble  traits  of  character  which  have  made  Mr.  Fessendeu's 
death  to  be  felt  as  a  national  calamity,  as  of  the  personal  loss 


WILLIAM    PITT    FESSENDEN. 


17 


which  I  myself  feel  at  his  departure.  Only  three  others  are 
now  left  who  were  here  when  I  came  to  the  Senate,  and  there 
is  but  one  who  came  with  me.  There  has  been  no  one  here 
since  I  came  to  whom  I  oftener  went  for  counsel  and  whose 
opinions  I  have  been  accustomed  more  to  respect  than  those  of 
our  departed  friend.  There  were  occasions  during  our  fourteen 
years'  service  together  when  we  differed  about  minor  matters 
and  had  controversies  for  the  time  unpleasant,  but  I  never  lost 
my  respect  for  him  nor  do  I  believe  he  ever  did  his  for  me. 
He  was  my  friend,  more  closely  perhaps  the  last  year  or  two 
than  ever  before.  Like  other  Senators,  I  shall  miss  him  in  the 
daily  transactions  of  this  chamber,  and  perhaps  more  than  any 
other  shall  miss  him  as  the  one  person  from  whom  I  most  fre 
quently  sought  advice.  I  am  not  one  of  those,  however,  who 
believe  that  constitutional  liberty,  our  free  institutions,  or  the 
progress  of  the  age  depend  upon  any  one  individual.  When 
the  great  and  good  Lincoln  was  stricken  down  I  did  not  believe 
that  the  Government  would  fail  or  liberty  perish.  Though  his 
loss  may  have  subjected  the  country  to  many  trials  it  would  not 
otherwise  have  had,  still  our  Government  stands  and  liberty 
survives. 

Another  has  taken  Mr.  Fesseuden's  place;  others  will  soon 
occupy  ours,  to  discharge  their  duties  better  perhaps  than  we 
have  done,  and  he  among  us  to-day  will  be  fortunate  indeed,  if 
when  his  work  on  earth  is  done  he  shall  leave  behind  him  a  life 
so  pure  and  useful,  a  reputation  so  unsullied,  a  patriotism  so 
ardent,  and  a  statesmanship  so  conspicuous  as  William  Pitt 
Fesseuden. 


REMARKS    BY    MR.  ANTHONY,  OF    RHODE    IS^AN£>  ,»  ^ 

Mr.  President :  It  is  not  with  the  expectation  of 
tiring  to  what  has  been  said,  but  rather  for  the  gratification  of 
my  own  feelings,  that  I  rise  to  add  one  more  tribute  to  the 


0 


18  KEMAKKSOFMK.    ANTHOKYON 

worth  of  our  friend,  whose  face  we  shall  not  again  see  with 
mortal  eyes.  His  history  has  been  recited  by  those  who  knew 
him  from  his  youth,  his  character  has  been  depicted  by  those 
who  loved  him.  Much  of  that  history  passed  under  our  own 
observation;  and  all  of  that  character  was  appreciated  and 
admired  by  those  who  were  associated  with  him  in  this  body, 
and  who,  by  general  consent,  accorded  to  him  a  place  second  to 
that  of  no  man  in  it. 

In  rendering  my  cordial  assent  to  all  that  has  been  spoken  in 
praise  of  Mr.  Fessenden  I  only  repeat  of  him  dead  what  I 
have  said  of  him  living.  It  is  the  general  fortune  of  eminent 
public  men  to  be  greatly  slandered  in  life  and  to  be  unduly 
eulogized  in  death.  If  Mr.  Fessenden  did  not  altogether 
escape  the  former,  history  will  admit  that  even  the  high  praise 
that  has  been  pronounced  upon  him  to-day,  is  not  exaggerated, 
is  not  the  outpouring  of  personal  friendship,  which  seeks  relief 
from  its  sorrow  in  the  extravagance  of  eulogy,  but  the  deliber 
ate  judgment  which  those  who  were  long  associated  with  him 
had  formed  of  his  character.  That  judgment  which  is  ex 
pressed  in  words  after  his  death,  was  expressed  in  acts  during 
his  life.  The  great  weight  which  his  counsels  carried  in  this 
chamber,  the  uniform  respect  paid  to  his  opinions,  and  the  con 
spicuous  positions  assigned  to  him,  all  attest  the  estimation  in 
which  he  was  held.  And  this  estimation  was  undoubtedly 
founded  on  real  merit,  for  Mr.  Fessenden  had  not  the  arts  of 
popularity,  and  perhaps  held  in  too  light  esteem  those  appli 
ances  of  suavity  which  often  cover  pretension  and  superficial- 
ness,  but  by  which  real  merit  does  not  sometimes  disdain  to 
strengthen  itself.  Hence  he  relied  upon  facts  fairly  presented 
and  upon  arguments  logically  adduced,  for  the  success  of  a 
measure,  and,  when  these  failed,  he  did  not  resort  to  personal 
solicitations  or  individual  persuasions.  And  as  he  did  not 
make  such  appeals  himself,  so  he  did  not  yield  to  them  when 
they  came  from  others.  I  might  recall  to  you  some  remarkable 
instances  in  which  he  argued  for  the  convictions  of  his  judg- 


"WILLIAM   PITT    FESSENDEN. 


ment,  against  all  the  force  of  personal  solicitations,  backed  by 
his  own  sympathies.  This  temper  of  mind,  this  intellectual 
conscientiousness  gave  him,  with  superficial  observers,  the 
reputation  of  indifference  to  public  opinion. 

But  this  reputation  was  not  deserved.  On  the  contrary,  I 
think  that  he  was  sensitive  to  public  opinion,  and  honest  praise 
or  censure  affected  him,  perhaps,  the  more  because  he  would 
not  purchase  the  one  or  conciliate  the  other  by  concessions  that 
are  generally  regarded  as  venial.  For  that  public  opinion  which 
is  manufactured  to  order  he  had  great  contempt,  and  flattery 
did  not  impose  upon  him  ;  even  to  honest  but  transient  public 
opinion,  founded  on  limited  observation  and  shallow  reasoning, 
Mr.  Fessenden,  I  have  sometimes  thought,  did  not  give  the  con 
sideration  that  was  due;  for  this  is  not  to  be  overlooked,  in 
shaping  legislation;  and  under  free  institutions,  where  political 
parties  are  a  necessity,  statesmen  cannot  safely  forget  that  they 
are  also  politicians,  and  that,  working  through  the  instrument 
ality  of  party,  something  must  be  conceded  to  the  strength 
ening  of  that  party  which  they  hold  to  be  identified  with  the 
best  interests  of  the  country;  but  genuine  public  opinion,  the 
sentiment  of  thinking  men,  the  deliberate  judgment  of  the 
country,  Mr.  Fessenden  held  in  profound  respect;  and  although 
even  to  that  he  would  not  sacrifice  his  conscientious  convic 
tions,  he  differed  from  it  cautiously  and  reluctantly. 

By  some,  who  knew  him  slightly,  Mr.  Fessenden  was  regarded 
as  a  haughty  man.  This  he  was  not,  in  any  offensive  sense  of 
the  word.  He  was  grave  and  reserved;  uncommonly  quick  of 
apprehension,  he  was  impatient  of  the  sometimes  slower  pro 
cesses  of  other  minds,  and  he  carried  his  intolerance  of  pre 
tense  and  sham  to  a  fault  —  to  a  fault,  because  he  sometimes 
confounded  these  with  what  were  only  the  harmless  peculiari 
ties  or  even  the  deliberate  judgments  of  others;  but  whatever 
he  might  claim  for  the  conclusions  to  which  he  had  brought  his 
mind,  he  assumed  no  superiority  for  himself  in  reaching  them. 
A  truer,  kinder  heart  beats  in  no  living  breast  than  that  which 


20  REMARKS   OF    MB.    ANTHONY   ON 

now  lies  cold  and  pulseless.  The  universal  affection  in  which 
he  was  held  by  those  who  sustained  to  him  the  relations  of  de 
pendence  and  subordination  is  the  best  proof  of  this. 

It  is  not  given  to  men  to  achieve  perfection ;  else  this  would 
not  be  a  state  of  discipline;  but  of  those  elements  which  go 
towards  it  few  possess  so  many  as  did  Mr.  Fesseuden,  conspic 
uous  less  for  the  fleeting  graces  that  adorn  a  character  than  for 
the  solid  virtues  that  dignify  and  ennoble  it;  with  small  por 
tion  of  the  manner  which  the  great  and  the  little  may  alike  put 
on,  with  much  of  the  qualities  that  only  the  great  and  the  good 
possess. 

He  will  long  be  held  in  grateful  and  affectionate  remem 
brance  for  his  masculine  and  vigorous  intellect,  for  his  pure 
and  honest  statesmanship,  for  his  careful  and  exact  acquire 
ment,  for  the  independence  which  nothing  could  shake,  for  the 
integrity  which  nothing  could  corrupt ;  and  underlying  all,  for 
that  sound  common  sense,  that  intellectual  as  well  as  moral 
rectitude,  upon  which,  as  upon  a  basis  of  enduring  granite, 
rose  the  beautiful  superstructure  of  his  character. 

How  often,  Mr.  President,  during  the  troublous  and  perilous 
times  during  which  you  and  I  have  been  associated  in  the  pub 
lic  councils,  how  often  when  clouds  settled  darkest  upon  us  and 
dangers  gathered  thickest  around  us,  have  we  felt  to  invoke 
the  spirits  of  the  mighty  dead  and  to  call  upon  the  fathers  of 
the  republic,  that  they  wrould  absent  them  "  from  felicity  awhile," 
and  leaving  the  mansions  of  eternal  rest,  mingle  once  more  in 
the  contests  of  earthly  affairs,  and  teach  us  how  to  preserve 
the  institutions  which  their  wisdom  and  patriotism  had  estab 
lished.  And  when,  turning  from  the  unanswering  dead  to  the 
living  present,  we  have  looked  to  those  who  were  wisest  in 
council,  firmest  in  purpose,  and  purest  in  heart,  never  did  we  fail 
to  recognize  among  them  him  whom  we  now  lament.  And  it 
seems  to  us  that  he  is  taken  from  us  at  a  time  when  he  is  most 
needed,  when  the  questions  are  impending  that  he  best  could 
grapple,  when  the  problems  are  presented  that  he  best  could 


WILLIAM    PITT    FESSENDEN.  21 

solve.  We  look  around  for  those  who  shall  fill  his  place.  But 
there  is  One  who  doeth  all  things  well.  In  the  order  of  His 
providence  it  is  not  permitted  for  any  place  long  to  remain  va 
cant  ;  whomever  He  takes  away,  He  raises  up  others  to  fill  the 
void  that  is  left.  So  it  was  with  Douglas ;  so  it  was  with  Colla- 
rner;  so  it  was  with  Foot;  so  it  was  with  Lincoln.  So  it  will  be 
with  Fessenden.  Aiid  so,  Mr.  President — long  distant  be  the 
day — will  it  be  with  you  and  with  others,  our  wisest  and  our 
best.  Men  die,  but  their  words  are  left  on  record,  their  works 
remain,  their  example  survives.  He  who  has  made  a  record 
like  that  which  we  are  now  reviewing,  he  who  has  achieved  a 
character  like  that  which  we  now  hold  up  to  the  youth  of  Amer 
ica,  may  well  say,  when  the  supreme  hour  arrives — 

"  Non  omnis  moriar,  multaque  pars  mci 
Vitabit  Libitinam." 


REMARKS    BY  MR.  WILLIAMS,  OF  OREGON. 

Mr.  President:  William  Pitt  Fessenden,  though  not  without 
his  faults,  was  in  many  respects  a  model  Senator  and  states 
man.  Education  and  experience  had  cultivated  and  matured 
his  mental  faculties,  and  to  the  consideration  of  every  public 
question  upon  which  he  was  called  to  act  he  brought  a  careful, 
enlightened,  and  independent  judgment.  Official  association 
of  more  than  ordinary  intimacy  enabled  me  to  observe  and 
appreciate  those  qualities  of  his  character  which  too  often  dis 
tinguish  the  ideal  from  the  actual  Senator.  Of  these  the  most 
striking,  that  which  gave  tone  and  complexion  to  the  others, 
was  his  utter  repugnance  to  every  form  of  indirection  and  de 
ceit,  and  his  profound  contempt  for  all  the  arts  and  appliances 
of  the  demagogue.  Conscious  of  the  rectitude  of  his  own  pur 
poses,  and  confident  in  the  correctness  of  his  own  views,  pop 
ular  clamor  was  to  him  as  the  breath  of  an  idle  wind,  and 


22  REMARKS    OP   MR.    WILLIAMS    OK 

to  argue  that  a  proposed  policy  which  he  believed  to  be 
wrong  would  please  the  people,  was  to  employ  the  weakest  of 
means  to  influence  his  sturdy  judgment.  Nothing  seemed  to 
disturb  him  more  than  an  effort  to  carry  through  the  Senate 
for  partisan  ends  some  measure  which  he  conceived  to  be  un 
reasonable  or  unjust;  and  I  have  seen  him  writhe  with  pain  at 
the  delivery  of  speeches  here  whose  fallacies  and  false  conclu 
sions,  though  obvious  to  him,  were  plausible  enough  to  impose 
upon  the  ignorant  or  mislead  the  unreflecting  populace.  Deep 
down  in  his  nature  was  implanted  an  instinctive  resistance  to 
the  smiles  of  flattery  as  well  as  the  frowns  of  disfavor,  and  by 
either  he  was  as  immovable  as  the  mountain  cliff  whose 
rugged  brow  encounters  the  sunshine  and  the  storm  with 
equal  indifference. 

Arising  from  one's  intercourse  with  some  men  of  irreproach 
able  character,  there  is  a  doubt  as  to  the  solidity  of  their 
moral  structure,  a  fear  that  in  some  unhappy  moment  tempt 
ation  may  overpower  them;  but  no  such  doubts  or  fears 
obtruded  themselves  into  the  company  of  Mr.  Fessenden. 
Perfect  faith  in  his  integrity  not  only  possessed  all  those 
who  approached  him,  but  from  his  presence  there  proceeded 
the  perfect  assurance  that  he  was  as  much  beyond  the  reach  of 
corruption  as  the  polished  steel  is  beyond  the  reach  of  that 
rust  which  fastens  itself  upon  the  softer  and  baser  metals. 
While  calumny  with  its  thousand  tongues  discussed  the  pro 
ceedings  in  this  body  upon  the  trial  of  the  late  President,  there 
was  none  so  wicked  or  malicious  as  to  whisper  that  Mr.  Fes- 
senden's  motives  upon  that  occasion  were  subject  to  sordid 
influences.  Many  questioned  the  legality  and  correctness  of 
his  opinion ;  many  were  deeply  pained  at  his  vote ;  but  there 
was  that  in  his  solid  and  noble  character  that  made  it  impos 
sible  to  suppose  that  his  convictions  were  not  as  pure  in  origin 
as  they  were  fearless  in  expression.  Some  men  whose  public 
and  official  acts  admit  of  no  question  allow  themselves  to  be 
drawn  into  various  irregularities  and  impurities  of  private  life; 


WILLIAM    PITT    FESSEXDEN. 


but  he  was  as  free  from  dissipation  and  all  its  affiliated  vices 
as  lie  was  free  from  contact  with  any  scheme  of  plundering  or 
fraudulent  legislation.  Much  is  said  about  the  corruption  of 
Congress,  a  thousand  times  more  than  is  true ;  but  be  that  as 
it  may,  it  will  be  a  great  consolation  to  the  family  and  friends 
of  the  departed  Senator  that  through  all  the  seductions  and 
temptations  of  a  long  and  varied  political  life,  he  came  down 
to  his  grave  full  of  years  and  full  of  honors,  a  pure  and  honest 
man. 

Intellectually,  Mr.  Fessenden  was  among  the  foremost  men 
of  the  country.  Putting  aside  the  discussion  upon  the  slavery 
question,  in  which  the  pre-eminence  without  dispute  belongs  to 
another,  he  towered  in  mind  among  those  around  him  like 
Saul  in  form  among  his  countrymen.  While  admitting  his 
title  to  this  distinction,  candor  compels  me  to  say  that  upon 
any  novel  and  exciting  question  where  the  road  to  success 
seemed  to  lie  through  the  chances  of  recklessness  and  temerity, 
he  did  not  possess  the  requisite  qualifications  for  a  great  par 
liamentary  leader.  He  believed  that  caution  was  the  parent 
of  safety.  He  was  so  careful  not  to  do  wrong  that  sometimes 
he  seemed  afraid  to  do  right.  All  that  there  was  akin  to  cow 
ardice  in  the  nature  of  Mr.  Fesseuden  is  indicated  by  Shake 
speare,  when  he  says  that — 

"  Conscience  makes  cowards  of  us  all." 

Prudence  is  not  unfrequently  mistaken  for  timidity,  and  it  is 
hard  to  tell  where  one  ends  and  the  other  begins  5  but  that  the 
deceased  should  be  described  as  a  prudent  rather  than  a  timid 
man,  is  evidenced  by  the  fact  that  as  to  any  untried  experi 
ment  in  legislation,  while  he  thought  little  of  himself,  he  was 
much  concerned  about  its  effect  upon  the  safety  and  happiness 
of  the  people  or  the  honor  and  peace  of  the  country.  One 
feature  of  the  senatorial  career  of  Mr.  Fessenden  deserves 
especial  mention,  and  that  is,  he  never  indulged  in  anything 
of  a  sensational  nature.  He  had  no  taste  for  legislative  pyro- 


24  KEMAEKS   OF   MR.    WILLIAMS   ON 

technics.  He  had  no  ambition  to  do  something  simply  to 
attract  attention  or  to  excite  comment.  All  that  he  said  and 
did  was  statesman-like  and  business-like,  and  looked  to  some 
useful  result.  I  may  add,  too,  that  he  did  not  pretend  to 
know  everything  or  discuss  every  question  before  the  Senate. 
Familiar  and  thoroughly  conversant  with  most  of  the  leading 
subjects  of  debate,  particularly  those  relating  to  finance,  he 
spoke  as  to  them  only  when  there  was  a  manifest  propriety  in 
his  speaking.  There  was  no  parade,  pomposity,  or  tinsel  about 
his  speeches.  French  was  his  aversion,  and  in  my  hearing  he 
never  made  a  Latin  or  poetical  quotation.  Greece  and  Rome 
he  left  with  his  college  exercises  in  the  classic  shades  of  Bow- 
doin.  Plain,  simple,  and  unaffected  in  manner  and  habit,  so 
he  was  in  speech,  and  his  style  was  as  pure  and  transparent 
as  the  water  of  a  New  England  brook.  When  Mr.  Fessenden 
arose  to  address  the  Senate,  it  will  not  be  irreverent  to  say 
that,  so  far  as  the  subject  under  discussion  was  concerned,  he 
was  generally  able  to  say,  "Let  there  be  light,  and  there  was 
light."  Clearness  of  expression  more  than  anything  else  distin 
guished  his  speeches,  so  that  the  ideas  presented,  instead  of 
the  words  in  which  they  were  clothed,  filled  the  mind  of  the 
hearer.  One  of  the  justices  of  the  Supreme  Court  told  me 
that  many  years  ago  he  was  associated  with  Mr.  Fessenden  in 
the  trial  of  a  cause.  According  to  agreement  the  judge  was 
to  argue  the  law,  for  which  he  made  elaborate  preparation, 
and  the  late  Senator  was  to  state  the  facts.  Mr.  Fessenden 
made  his  statement,  aft.er  which  the  court  said  that  nothing- 
further  was  necessary  on  that  side  of  the  case.  So  clear,  con 
densed,  and  convincing  was  his  presentation  of  the  facts  that 
no  room  was  left  for  argument.  As  a  debater  our  departed 
friend  had  few  equals.  Logic,  sarcasm,  and  ridicule  were 
employed  as  circumstances  seemed  to  require.  He  analyzed 
and  dissipated  an  adverse  argument.  Clearness,  vigor,  and 
acuteness  characterized  his  discourses.  Saladin's  sword  was 
not  sharper  than  his  intellect.  To  describe  him  in  the  prornis- 


WILLIAM   PITT    FESSENDEN. 


25 


cuous  debates  of  this  body  I  would  borrow  the  language  of 

Tennyson : 

"When  0110  would  aim  an  arrow  fair, 
But  scud  it  slackly  from  the  string, 
And  one  would  pierce  an  outer  ring, 
And  one  an  inner,  here  and  there, 
And  last  the  master  bowman,  he 
Would  cleave  the  mark." 

Common  sense  and  a  practical  view  of  things  were  the 
noticeable  features  of  Mr.  Fessenden's  statesmanship.  Poets, 
orators,  and  philosophers  may  rise  to  eminence  by  the  display 
of  a  brilliant  or  eccentric  genius,  but  no  man  can  be  a  wise  and 
safe  statesman  without  a  large  endowment  of  common  sense, 
or,  in  other  words,  of  that  clearness  and  comprehension  of 
mind  which  enables  him  to  form  correct  judgments.  Theories 
and  abstractions  have  been  and  are  the  bane  of  the  Republic, 
and  the  less  a  man  charged  with  public  affairs  has  to  do  with 
them  the  better  for  the  country.  Eight  and  wrong,  as  applied 
to  political  affairs,  are  oftentimes  relative  and  not  absolute 
terms.  To-day  a  policy  may  be  right  and  the  circumstances  of 
the  people  to  be  affected  by  it  may  wholly  change,  and  then  it 
may  be  wrong.  So  thought  Mr.  Fessenden.  Free  from  all 
Utopian  ideas,  he  acted  upon  men  and  things  as  he  found  them, 
not  as  they  might  or  ought  to  be;  and  his  action  carefully 
looked  to  the  interests  and  welfare  of  all  concerned.  Some 
have  said,  with  more  or  less  truth,  that  he  was  conservative. 
No  doubt  he  had  some  reverence  for  time-honored  things.  He 
loved,  like  many  lawyers,  to  walk  in  the  ancient  ways;  he  had 
no  pleasure  in  the  work  of  destruction;  he  believed  in  letting 
well  enough  alone ;  but  after  all,  the  records  of  Congress  will 
show  that  he  was  a  friend  to  all  those  great  modern  reforms  in 
government  that  have  redeemed  and  purified  the  Eepublic. 

There  was  a  grace  of  modesty  about  the  deportment  of  Mr. 
Fessenden.  He  had  none  of  the  "I  am  Sir  Oracle"  way  about 
him.  Nor  had  he  any  of  that  offensive  dogmatism  which  age 
sometimes  arrogates  to  itself,  though  he  was  frequently  emphatic 
and  severe  in  the  statement  of  his  views.  He  had  no  ambition 


A  R 

.srry 
>/i\f 


26  EEMARKS    OP   ME.    WILLIAMS    ON 

to  appear  to  be  more  than  lie  was.  Among  those  who  depend 
upon  newspapers  for  information  he  did  not  pass  current  at  his 
real  value.  Keenly  alive  to  any  breath  upon  the  purity  of  his 
character,  he  took  no  pains  to  cultivate  notoriety.  His  reputa 
tion  was  the  product  of  no  hot-bed  appliances,  but  slowly  and 
noiselessly  it  grew  strong  and  high,  like  the  tall  pines  of  his 
native  State,  whose  heads  revel  proudly  in  the  highest  winds  of 
heaven.  No  little  was  said  in  the  lifetime  of  our  friend  about 
the  infirmity  of  his  temper.  That  he  was  irritable  at  times  is 
true.  That  lie  suffered  much  from  physical  debility  is  also  true. 
He  was  a  nervous  and  high-strung  man.  He  was  compelled  to 
struggle  for  self-control.  Charity,  however,  and  a  conscious 
ness  of  our  own  imperfections  should  draw  a  veil  over  this 
slight  defect  in  one  otherwise  so  good ;  and  whatever  his  foibles 
were  in  this  respect  it  can  only  be  said  of  him  "he  but  stum 
bled  in  the  path  we  have  in  weakness  trod."  To  show  more 
of  this  let  me  state  that  I  was  a  member  of  two  committees  of 
which  he  was  chairman,  and  once  only  did  his  anger  break  out 
in  hasty  words  toward  me.  Believing  "that  a  friend  should 
bear  his  friend's  infirmities,"  I  did  not  notice  the  matter;  but 
in  a  few  moments  he  came  and  in  the  kindest  and  most  apolo 
getic  manner  expressed  his  deep  regret  at  the  unpleasant 
occurrence.  While  I  knew  the  deceased  he  displayed  little 
fondness  for  society.  He  rather  shrank  from  the  fashionable 
gatherings  and  gayeties  of  the  capital.  He  was  not  so  easy 
of  approach  as  some  less  agreeable  to  meet.  There  was  a  dig 
nity  in  his  bearing  that  repressed  familiarity.  His  intimate 
associates  were  few,  but  to  these  he  seemed  strongly  attached. 
Fawning  and  flattery  were  foreign  to  his  nature.  Those  who 
conceived  a  dislike  for  him  found  their  own  reasons  for  a 
change  of  feeling.  With  much  of  truth  it  may  be  said  of  him 
that  he  was — 

"  Lofty  and  sour  to  those  who  loved  him  not, 
But,  to  those  men  that  sought  him,  sweet  as  summer." 

When  the  last  session  of  Congress  adjourned,  in  the  seats 


WILLIAM   PITT    FESSENDEN.  27 

nearest  to  mine  sat  two  distinguished  Senators,  now  gone. 
One  is  dead,  and  the  other  is  in  foreign  lands  seeking  for 
health.     Similar  in  many  respects,   they  were  the  devoted 
friends  of  each  other  and  friends  of  mine.    While  I  am  paying 
this  humble  tribute  to  the  memory  of  the  one  whom  death  has 
taken,  I  would  not  forget  the  other  and  older  friend  stricken 
and  away.    Unhappily  for  the  country  his  public  life  is  ended, 
and  the  State  that  he  so  long  represented  here  will  be  fortu 
nate  indeed  if  it  finds  another  equal  in  intelligence,  integrity, 
and  power  to  occupy  his  place  in  this  body.    When  the  sun  of 
a  bright  day  declines  below  the  horizon,  a  softened  radiance 
lingers  among  the  shadows  of  approaching  night,  and  so  it  is 
when  a  good  man  goes  down  from  a  high  position  in  the  world 
to  his  resting-place  in  the  grave.    Streaming  behind  him  is  the 
effulgence  of  an  exalted  character  to  illumine  the  way  for 
others  and  to  lighten  and  soothe  the  sorrows  of  bereavement. 
Where    the    departed    statesman   lived    and  died  the    bells 
have  tolled  their  farewell  peals;  the  pall,  the  hearse,  and  the 
funeral  procession  have  passed  and  gone.     "Ashes  to  ashes 
and  dust  to  dust"  have  been  spoken,  and  to  her  maternal 
bosom  the  earth  has  folded  his  mortal  remains ;  and  now  we, 
his  fellow  Senators,  have  met  in  this  Chamber,  where  his  per 
son  and  voice  were  once  so  familiar,  to  celebrate  the  closing 
scenes.    This  is  the  last  of  ceremony.    Bowing  our  heads  to 
the  will  of  Providence,  and  striving  to  shun  his  few  faults  and 
emulate  his  many  virtues,  to  the  affection  of  those  who  loved 
him,  to  the  gratitude  of  a  country  he  served  long  and  well, 
and  to  the  safe-keeping  of  impartial  history,  with  faith  and 
pride  we  commit  the  memory  and  fame  of  William  Pitt  Fes- 
senden. 


EEMAEKS  BY  ME.  MOEEILL,  OF  VEEMONT. 

Mr.  President:  In  this  body,  so  comparatively  few  in  num 
bers,  the  sudden  death  of  any  member  is  sure  to  be  felt,  but 


28  REMARKS   OF   MR.    MORRILL   ON 

when  one  of  the  ripest  and  most  experienced  of  its  members  is 
taken  away,  to  return  no  more  forever,  each  one  of  us  counts 
the  nation's  loss  as  his  own  personal  bereavement.  The  golden 
counsel,  the  enlightened  guidance,  commended  by  long  years 
of  daily  association  and  by  numberless  acts  of  brotherly  kind 
ness,  henceforth  is  to  live  only  in  our  memory  and  speak  only 
in  the  records  of  the  past.  Our  country  has  lost  in  the  death 
of  Mr.  Fessenden  one  of  its  wisest  statesmen;  and  after  fifteen 
years  of  cordial  intercourse  and  most  friendly  relations,  public 
and  private,  my  heart  would  reproach  me  if  I  failed  to  avow 
that  I  have  lost  a  trusted  friend,  or  refrained  from  attempting 
a  brief  tribute  to  his  memory.  The  measures  with  which  I 
had  most  to  do  in  the  other  House  brought  me  early  and  con 
stantly  into  close  relations  with  the  late  Senator,  then  on  the 
Committee  on  Finance,  where  he  succeeded  Mr.  Hunter,  a  very 
able  and  painstaking  legislator;  and  having  also  boarded 
with  him  for  several  sessions  of  Congress  at  the  same  table,  I 
came  to  know,  and,  therefore,  although  not  always  in  entire 
sympathy  with  his  views,  to  appreciate  him  highly.  But  I 
shall  barely  sketch  two  or  three  points,  without  attempting 
any  complete  analysis,  of  his  life  and  character. 

That  he  had  large  capacity  and  a  sagacious  judgment  the 
whole  country  gratefully  acknowledges,  and  as  a  public  ser 
vant  no  purer  nor  more  incorruptible  man,  as  I  am  persuaded, 
ever  came  within  the  walls  of  the  Capitol.  No  unlawful  gain 
swelled  his  estate  or  swayed  his  opinions.  In  the  rage  of 
fiercest  political  conflicts  no  breath  of  suspicion  has  ever 
assailed  his  integrity  or  dimmed  the  brightness  of  his  honor. 
Neither  gain  nor  personal  aggrandizement  had  any  power  to 
bend  his  lofty  independence.  It  is  not  to  be  believed  that  he 
could  have  been  induced  to  vary  his  political  principles  a 
hair's  breadth,  or  to  abandon  any  cherished  opinion,  for  even 
the  highest  pinnacle  of  ambition  our  Government  affords — a 
temptation  which  sometimes  proves  fatal  to  the  successful  career 
of  public  men ;  and  for  those  who  trimmed  or  accommodated 


WILLIAM    PITT    FESSENDEX.  29 

their  position  to  win  the  stand-point  of  popular  availability 
he  could  not  conceal  profound  disgust. 

It  seemed  to  have  been  his  sole  ambition  to  be  an  American 
Senator,  not  inferior  in  dignity  and  virtue  to  the  best  Roman 
model,  and  few  have  so  eminently  and  so  usefully  adorned  the 
station  or  have  met  "the  inevitable  hour"  with  a  more  spotless 
reputation. 

Barely  do  we  behold  a  man  of  such  positive  traits  of  charac 
ter,  moving  always  with  such  courageous  and  independent 
action,  who  was  at  the  same  time  so  thoroughly  modest,  as  the 
late  Senator  Fessenden.  While  it  must  be  admitted  that  as  a 
debater  he  had  no  superior  in  the  Senate,  his  appearance  in 
debate  was  never  heralded  in  advance  by  any  note  of  prepara 
tion,  nor  was  he  eager  to  discover  and  appropriate  the  silent 
but  unmistakable  approval  which  usually  follows  successful 
argument  in  the  Senate.  He  was  not  a  petty  skirmisher,  but 
gave  his  views  from  a  broad  and  comprehensive  stand-point. 
From  long  holding  a  leading  position  here,  he  was  a  frequent, 
though  not  an  obtrusive  speaker,  neither  courting  iior  shun 
ning  debate,  and  never  seemed  to  feel  that  it  was  necessary  to 
his  reputation  for  him  to  mingle  in  every  question  that  came 
up  for  discussion  ;  for  he  conceded  to  others  the  power  of  say 
ing  all  that  was  necessary  to  be  said,  and  when  that  had  been 
said  he  was  even  irritated  by  a  further  consumption  of  time  in 
any  quarter.  He  made  no  speeches  for  distribution  or  for  his 
State,  except  so  far  as  his  State  was  an  integral  part  of  the 
nation.  His  great  aim  was  to  forward  the  business  immedi 
ately  before  the  Senate,  especially  such  business  as  he  had  in 
charge,  not  often  by  a  long  and  what  is  termed  an  exhaustive 
speech  upon  all  the  collateral  relations  of  the  subject,  but  he 
addressed  himself  mainly  and  with  much  energy  to  the  point 
where  he  thought,  after  all,  the  whole  question  hinged,  and 
the  admirable  swiftness  and  lucidity  with  which  he  did  this 
work  evinced  that  the  minor  points  were  not  concealed  from 
his  view,  though  below  his  ambition  to  present.  Yet  when  it 


30  REMARKS   OF   MB.    MORRILL   ON 

became  his  duty,  from  his  position  in  the  Senate  or  from  his 
place  on  committees,  to  lead  or  close  a  debate  upon  any  im 
portant  question,  then  he  showed  his  general  mastery  of  affairs, 
and  proved  himself  competent  to  handle  the  gravest  issues, 
whether  involving  constitutional  topics,  finance,  economy, 
peace,  or  war ;  and  all  that  he  needed,  whether  springing  from 
a  fresh  glimpse  of  the  subject  or  drawn  from  the  storehouse  of 
his  memory,  appeared  instantly  ready  for  his  use. 

Studious  of  facts,  guilty  of  no  nonsense,  reverent  to  the 
highest  principles  of  liberty  and  republican  policy,  cogent  and 
severely  logical  in  argument,  his  speeches  were  always  a 
marked  feature  in  any  debate;  and  if  he  encountered  any  op 
position  that  might  seem  to  check  his  career,  there  was  often  a 
sharpness  and  point  in  his  rejoinders  that  caused  him  to  be 
dreaded,  as  for  any  scores  so  received  he  could  not  contentedly 
long  sit  in  arrears.  Holding  the  formidable  power  of  sarcasm 
within  his  compressed  lips,  it  would  sometimes  escape  in 
sport — quite  as  often  in  bitter  earnest.  This  pungency  in 
debate  involved  him  in  conflicts,  not  infrequently  with  his 
dearest  friends,  but  they  forgave  him  as  he  forgave  them,  and 
he  never  withheld  a  generous  tribute  to  the  real  merits  of  even 
those  with  wrhom  he  was  least  in  accord,  being  fastidiously 
observant  not  to  forego  praise  in  such  directions,  lest  perhaps 
he  should  be  guilty  of  injustice. 

When  he  spoke,  with  nerves  as  firm  and  elastic  as  a  Damas 
cus  blade,  he  bore  himself  proudly  and  with  graceful  ease,  al 
ways  choosing  language  the  most  simple,  chaste,  and  fluent  to 
express  his  meaning ;  and  few  beholding  his  imperial  bearing 
would  have  suspected  his  sensitive  and  retiring  nature,  or  that 
something  of  nervous  soreness  and  prostration  followed  his 
every  effort.  He  sought  no  felicity  of  phraseology,  except  a 
direct  and  plump  expression  of  his  meaning.  For  grandilo 
quent  oratory  he  had  no  taste,  but  of  that  manly,  unaffected 
speech  which  is  thoroughly  in  earnest  to  force  conviction  upon 
the  hearers  he  was  a  consummate  master.  There  was  equal 


"WILLIAM    PITT    FESSEXDEX. 


energy  in  his  thought  and  manner  of  delivery,  but  it  is  not 
likely  that  he  ever  sought  eloquence  of  any  description,  or  if 
he  did  he  must  have  sought  the  kind  so  well  described  by 
Boliugbroke  when  he  said  : 

"  Eloquence  must  flow  like  a  stream  that  is  fed  by  an  abundant  spring, 
and  not  spout  forth  a  little  frothy  stream  on  some  gaudy  day  and  remain 
dry  for  the  rest  of  the  year." 

Those  who  were  invited  to  his  home  found  him  hospitable, 
cordial,  and  wonderfully  fascinating  in  manner  and  conversa 
tion,  as  he  was  a  brilliant  talker,  often  speaking  with  humor, 
and  far  more  ready  to  unload  his  memory  and  display  his 
learning,  love  of  poetry,  anecdote,  and  literary  resources  at 
his  own  fireside  than  in  any  more  public  theater.  He  made 
friends  and  watched  their  history  and  welfare  with  tenderest 
care,  not  for  the  selfish  purpose  of  subordinating  them  to  his 
private  advantage,  but  because  he  found  an  appropriate  place 
for  them  in  his  heart,  and  there  they  dwelt  forever,  in  no 
peril  of  being  displaced  by  other  new-found  tenants.  Fitted 
to  shine  in  society,  he  yet  generally  avoided  it,  to  the  deep 
regret  of  those  who  knew  him  best  and  loved  him  most,  as 
they  felt  that  lie  would  have  been  more  widely  beloved  had  he 
been  less  of  a  recluse. 

The  circumstances  under  which  Mr.  Fessenden  was  called  to 
the  Treasury  Department,  upon  the  resignation  of  Secretary 
Chaser  will  not  soon  be  forgotten.  Large  sums  of  money  were 
required  at  once  5  the  postponed  requisitions  lying  in  wait 
were  enormous,  and  the  credit  of  the  country  seemed  to  be 
sinking  beneath  the  heavy  load.  The  premium  on  gold  was 
doubled,  and  Government  paper  became  almost  valueless. 
General  distrust  pervaded  'all  financial  circles.  Nothing  but 
victories  in  the  field  promised  any  support  or  consolation  to 
the  country,  and  these  victories  were  slowly  and  hardly  to  be 
won  from  those  whose  considerable  successes  had  whetted  the 
appetite  for  more.  President  Lincoln  tendered  the  office  to 
Senator  Fessenden,  who  hesitated  long,  fearing,  as  the  diffi- 


REMARKS    OF   MR.    MORRILL   ON 


culties  surrounding  the  office  were  so  much  more  formidable 
than  was  generally  supposed,  that  he  should  fail  to  meet  the 
full  expectations  of  the  people,  while  he  was  conscious  that 
personally  he  had  everything  to  lose  and  nothing  to  gain  by 
leaving  the  Senate ;  yet  the  urgency  of  his  associates  here  on 
both  sides  of  the  Chamber,  and  the  hardly  less  potential  voice 
of  the  press  throughout  the  country,  seldom  summoning  small 
men  for  great  vacancies,  at  length  secured  his  acceptance  of 
the  position.  The  public  had  confidence  in  the  man  and  his 
sterling  integrity,  and  it  was  this  confidence  which  enabled 
him  to  carry  the  Treasury  safely  through  one  of  the  most 
gloomy  periods  in  the  history  of  the  late  rebellion.  He 
appealed  to  the  people  for  a  loan,  and  they  responded  with 
unprecedented  liberality.  He  nursed  the  national  banks  and 
ceased  to  inundate  the  country  with  legal-tender  currency. 
The  premium  on  gold  receded.  Public  credit  was  re-estab 
lished.  The  Secretary  had  justified  the  confidence  of  the 
public ;  but  only  intending  to  hold  the  position  temporarily,  in 
less  than  a  year  he  tendered  his  resignation  in  order  to  accept 
his  place  in  the  Senate,  to  which  Maine,  with  becoming 
State  pride  in  one  of  her  most  distinguished  sons,  had  again 
promptly  returned  him. 

The  administration  of  the  Treasury  Department  was  too 
brief  to  afford  any  opportunity  for  the  display  of  new  and 
original  financial  plans,  and  the  Secretary,  if  he  had  any  such 
plans,  which  may  be  questioned,  did  not  aim  at  brilliant 
theories  when  practical  wisdom,  economy,  and  integrity  wrould 
through  daily  use  serve  the  country  better. 

The  acceptance  by  Senator  Fessenden  of  the  Treasury 
Department  was  based  upon  a  principle  deeply  imbedded  in 
his  nature.  He  felt  that  he  was  called  from  a  station  where 
his  usefulness  had  been  unquestioned  to  a  new  and  untried 
field  to  which  he  had  never  had  any  aspirations,  and  where 
even  great  ability  and  the  utmost  devotion  might  not  com 
mand  success;  but  his  principle  was  that  "even  his  name 


WILLIAM   PITT    FESSENDEN.  33 

among  men  should  be  of  little  account  when  weighed  in 
the  balance  against  the  welfare  of  the  people,"  and  his 
administration  in  a  critical  emergency  proved  wise  and 
safe,  fully  deserving  a  liberal  recognition  now  as  it  is  sure  to 
receive  hereafter. 

The  most  conspicuous  instance  of  Mr.  Fessenden's  obstinate 
adherence  to  the  principle  already  referred  to  was  on  the  late 
impeachment  trial,  and  was  elaborately  enunciated  two  years 
earlier  in  his  fine  eulogy  upon  the  death  of  Senator  Foot, 
whom  he  loved  tenderly,  and  tenderly  lamented,  where,  after 
referring  to  all  that  a  faithful  Senator  will  have  to  encounter, 
he  said : 

"  All  this,  if  he  would  retain  his  integrity,  he  must  learn  to  bear  un 
moved  and  walk  steadily  onward  in  the  path  of  public  duty,  sustained 
only  by  the  reflection  that  time  may  do  him  justice,  or  if  not,  that  his 
individual  hopes  and  aspirations  and  even  his  name  among  men  should 
be  of  little  account  to  him  when  weighed  in  the  balance  against  the 
welfare  of  the  people,  of  whose  destiny  he  is  the  constituted  guardian 
and  defender." 

Two  years  after  these  words  were  uttered  he  practically 
showed  his  willingness  to  brave  popular  opinion,  and,  if  need 
be,  to  sacrifice  himself,  by  voting  for  the  acquittal  of  the 
President.  That  he  shocked  the  public  judgment  of  his  State, 
or  of  the  great  party  to  which  he  belonged,  (and  he  could 
belong  to  no  other,)  is  undeniable :  but,  however  mistaken  his 
views  were  thought  to  have  been  by  those  of  us  who  reached 
other  and  different  conclusions  upon  the  same  evidence,  I  am. 
not  aware  that  the  integrity  of  his  motives  was  ever  impugned 
by  any  of  his  peers.  He  probably  would  never  have  asked 
forgiveness  for  this  act,  but  time  gently  wears  away  some  of 
the  asperities  of  political  life,  and  his  people,  having  little  else 
to  forgive,  would  in  this  case  most  likely  have  granted  him 
absolution. 

He  was  the  natural  and  courageous  enemy  of  all  political 
quacks  and  quackery.  With  Addison  he  might  have  said : 

"  Believe  who  will  the  solemn  sham,  not  I." 


34  REMARKS    Or   MR.    MO  R  RILL   ON 

No  measure  not  resting  on  the  solid  foundations  of  reason 
and  public  policy  obtained  his  support.  He  snuffed  pretenders 
and  pretenses  afar  off  and  drove  them  ignominiously  from 
his  presence.  Even  though  a  friend  got  inflated  with  a 
bubble,  the  bubble  was  none  the  less  sure  by  him  to  be 
remorselessly  pricked.  He  espoused  no  cause  until  his  judg 
ment  was  convinced,  and  this  he  guarded  with  scrupulous  care 
against  all  false  weights.  Intensely  New  England  in  thought, 
as  well  as  in  form  and  feature,  yet  his  whole  record  might  in 
vain  be  searched  for  a  sectional  vote  or  a  sentiment  which 
might  not  fairly  belong  to  any  liberal-minded  statesman. 

It  is  well  known  that  the  late  rebellion  was  the  sequence  of  a 
conspiracy  gotten  up  in  this  Capitol,  based  upon  the  idea  that 
the  North  would  not  fight  and  that  peaceable  secession  was 
practically  safe  and  easy.  But  one  of  the  conspirators,  then 
serving  in  the  Senate  with  Mr.  Fesscnden,  did  not  conceal  his 
opinion  from  his  midnight  associates  that  the  straight  and 
slender  Senator  from  Maine  was  as  much  to  be  feared  as  any 
other  man  in  the  Senate.  Mr.  Fessenden  was  slow  to  believe 
that  the  Government  would  be  forced  to  resort  to  the  rigors  of 
actual  war ;  he  could  not  think  the  South  would  dare  to  bray 
the  institution  of  slavery  in  such  a  mortar;  but,  when  the  time 
came,  his  resolution  and  courage  fully  justified  the  apprehen 
sion  of  the  incipient  rebel.  Though  the  capital  of  our  country 
trembled  from  the  shock,  he  was  neither  confused  nor  terrified. 

No  legislator  labored  more  zealously  or  more  efficiently  for 
the  preservation  of  his  country,  and  at  the  close  of  the  war  his 
"report  from  the  committee  of  fifteen  on  reconstruction"  will 
long  rank  as  a  masterly  production  and  find  its  place  among 
the  ablest  State  papers  of  the  nation. 

If  he  had  his  faults  it  will  be  fortunate  for  those  of  us  who 
may  be  charged  with  less,  and  let  us  then  bear  willing  testi 
mony  to  those  pre-eminent  gifts  and  traits  of  character  the 
memory  of  which  must  now  swell  the  common  fame  of  our 
country  and  be  handed  down  as  a  legacy  to  posterity.  The 


WILLIAM   PITT   FESSENDEN.  35 

praise  of  to-day  will  not  be  inconsiderately  bestowed,  because 
it  justly  belongs  to  exalted  merit  and  worth. 

We  miss  a  true  friend,  a  manly  foe,  a  wise  and  useful 
legislator.  We  miss  an  American  Senator  who  was  warm  in 
his  affections  for  his  country  and  always  zealous  of  its  honor. 


REMARKS   BY  MR.  CATTELL,  OF   NEW  JERSEY. 

Mr.  President :  If  I  were  to  take  counsel  of  my  judgment 
rather  than  of  my  feelings,  I  am  sure  I  should  remain  a  silent 
listener  throughout  these  mournful  ceremonies,  for  I  cannot 
hope  to  add  anything  to  the  eloquent  and  impressive  words 
which  have  fallen  from  the  lips  of  those  who  have  preceded 
me,  nor  will  any  words  of  mine  add  to  the  justly  high  estimate 
which  the  people  of  this  country  have  formed  of  the  talents, 
patriotism,  and  eminent  services  of  the  distinguished  states 
man  whose  loss  we  mourn. 

But  I  should  do  violence  to  the  promptings  of  my  heart  if  I 
failed  on  this  occasion  to  offer  my  tribute  of  respect  and 
affection  to  the  memory  of  my  departed  friend. 

It  is  no  part  of  my  purpose  to  attempt  any  delineation  of 
the  character  of  Mr.  Fessenden,  or  to  speak  of  the  eminent 
services  he  has  rendered  to  the  country  on  this  floor  and  else 
where,  in  the  most  critical  period  of  our  nation's  history.  His 
colleague  and  others  have  fitly  spoken  of  his  public  career, 
and  it  may  safely  be  left  for  the  pen  of  the  historian  to  com 
plete  the  record.  My  purpose  is  a  more  simple  and  grateful 
one.  I  bring  from  the  garden  of  the  heart  a  few  fresh,  modest 
flowers,  dripping  with  the  dew  of  affection,  to  cast  upon  the 
grave  of  the  friend  I  loved. 

Mr.  Fessendeu  was  my  friend.  When  three  years  ago  I  came 
to  this  chamber,  fresh  from  the  busy  walks  of  a  stirring  com 
mercial  life  which  afforded  little  time  for  the  careful  study  of 
public  affairs,  a  stranger  to  most  of  the  members  of  the  body, 
unfamiliar  with  the  forms  of  legislation,  deeply  impressed  with 


36  EEMAKKS   OF   MK.    CATTELL   ON 

the  responsibilities  of  my  new  position,  and  distrustful  of  my 
ability  to  do  justice  to  my  State,  he  took  me  by  the  hand, 
addressed  to  me  generous  words  of  encouragement,  gave  me 
his  confidence,  and  honored  me  with  his  friendship,  and  with 
all  the  kindness,  delicacy,  and  affection  of  an  elder  brother,  he 
continued  to  the  end  to  be  my  constant  counselor  and  steadfast 
friend. 

At  the  very  outset  of  my  senatorial  career  he  was  kind 
enough  to  express  a  wish  to  have  me  placed  on  the  Finance 
Committee,  of  which  he  was  then  chairman ;  a  position  which 
as  a  new  member  I  had  no  right  to  expect,  but  a  compliment  I 
fully  appreciated.  For  more  than  two  years  it  has  been  my 
privilege  to  occupy  a  seat  by  his  side  in  this  chamber,  kindly 
invited  thereto  by  himself.  I  had  therefore  the  advantage  of 
enjoying  to  a  large  extent  his  brilliant  and  instructive  conver 
sation  on  subjects  of  public  interest,  and  also  ample  oppor 
tunity  to  study  the  characteristics  of  his  mind  and  heart  in 
the  unrestricted  social  intercourse  which  such  proximity  natur 
ally  begets  between  friends. 

Mr.  President,  William  P.  Fessenden  was  an  honest  man; 
and,  sir, 

.    "An  honest  man's  the  noblest  work  of  God." 

He  was  the  truest  man  to  his  convictions  I  have  ever  known. 
He  had  that  combination  of  qualities  which  alone  can  make  a 
great  statesman — a  clear  head  and  a  pure  heart  coupled  with  a 
firm  will  and  a  determined  spirit.  Moreover,  I  can  bear  testi 
mony  that  he  was  a  man  of  the  finest  sensibilities,  the  most 
tender-hearted  and  affectionate  of  men.  I  speak  of  this  be 
cause  I  fear  in  some  quarters  he  was  not  in  this  respect  fully 
understood.  In  the  heat  and  fervor  of  current  off-hand  debate, 
wherein  I  think  he  was  without  a  rival  in  this  chamber,  his 
keen,  sharp,  incisive  style  and  earnest  manner  would  some 
times  wound  an  opponent;  but  he  bore  malice  toward  none, 
and  I  think  if  may  be  truthfully  said  of  him,  as  he  said  of  the 
lamented  Senator  Foot,  "Impulsive  and  ardent  in  tempera- 


WILLIAM    PITT    FESSENDEN.  37 

ment,  he  was  generous  and  forgiving.  If  injury  excited  him 
to  anger,  it  was  a  generous  anger  which  could  hardly  outlive 
the  occasion  and  perished  of  itself  if  left  alone." 

But  I  forbear.  I  rose  only  to  speak  of  him  as  my  friend.  I 
was  on  the  far-off  shores  of  the  Pacific  when  the  telegraph 
brought  to  that  distant  point  the  account  of  Mr.  Fessenden's 
extreme  illness.  In  common  with  other  members  of  this  body 
then  in  California,  I  watched  with  intense  anxiety  the  daily 
bulletin  from  his  home  by  the  shores  of  the  Atlantic;  and  if 
ever  there  went  up  to  Heaven  from  my  heart  of  hearts  an 
earnest  ejaculation,  it  was  that  God  would  spare  his  life. 

But  it  was  otherwise  ordered.  The  bolt  has  fallen;  and 
while  we  sorrow  for  the  loss  of  the  patriot,  statesman,  and 
friend,  it  becomes  us  to  bow  submissively  to  the  will  of  Him 
"  who  doeth  all  things  well."  Mr.  President,  there  are  others 
here  who  have  known  Mr.  Fessenden  longer  than  I  have,  who 
have  shared  with  him  for  long  years  the  duties  and  responsi 
bilities  of  public  life;  others  who  respected  him  in  his  life, 
enjoyed  his  friendship,  and  now  lament  his  death.  But  no  one 
in  this  chamber  I  am  sure  will  more  deeply  i'eel  the  void  cre 
ated  by  his  death,  or  miss  his  companionship  more,  than  I.  My 
heart  sinks  within  me  at  the  thought  that  I  shall  no  more  hear 
his  kindly  morning  salutation,  no  more  look  into  his  classic 
face,  no  more  feel  the  warm  pressure  of  his  hand.  All  this  is 
gone,  and  gone  forever;  but  I  shall  hold  in  perpetual  and 
grateful  remembrance  the  pleasant  memories  of  our  friendly 
relations  on  earth.  It  only  remains  for  me  to  say,  farewell, 
kind  friend,  farewell. 


REMARKS  BY  MR.  PATTERSON,  OF  NEW  HAMPSHIRE. 

Mr.  President:  We  have  not  rested  to-day  from  the  ordinary 
routine  of  legislation  to  exhibit  a  simulated  sorrow  or  to  enact 
an  empty  pageant  at  the  grave  of  our  fallen  associate.  The 
Senate  is  oppressed  with  an  abiding  sense  of  its  bereavement, 


38  REMARKS    OF   MR.    PATTERSON    ON 

and  with  the  painful  thought  that  one  of  the  wisest  of  its  coun 
cilors  will  never  again  return  to  participate  in  its  delib 
erations. 

We  all  respected,  and  those  who  knew  him  intimately  loved, 
William  Pitt  Fessenden.  He  was  sometimes  tempted  into 
sharp  controversies  in  the  arena  of  debate,  for  his  convictions 
were  profound,  his  emotional  nature  quick,  and  a  sarcasm 
sharper  than  a  Damascus  blade  was  ready  at  his  command. 
It  is  natural  and  pardonable  that  a  trained  master  in  the  art  of 
advocacy  and  defense  should  enter  the  lists  and  fight  valiantly 
when  either  an  old  friend  or  a  cherished  measure  is  attacked. 

"  We  have  seen  the  intellectual  race 
Of  giants  stand  like  Titans  face  to  face ; 
Athos  and  Ida  with  a  dashing  sea 
Of  eloquence  between,  which  flowed  all  free, 
As  the  deep  billows  of  the  ^Egean  roar 
Betwixt  the  Hellenic  and  the  Phrygian  shore." 

The  wounds  he  inflicted  were  given  without  malice,  though 
they  were  sometimes  deep  and  painful;  but  his  antagonists 
were  noble,  and  their  animosities  are  now  all  buried  in 
his  grave.  He  was  not  a  politician,  but  an  incorruptible 
statesman,  and  our  bereavement  is  therefore  a  national 
loss. 

Baptized  into  the  name  of  England's  greatest  minister,  he 
seems  to  have  been  dedicated  from  the  cradle  to  public  affairs. 
He  was  born  at  Boscawen,  New  Hampshire,  on  the  IGth  of 
October,  1806,  within  a  few  miles  of  the  birth-place  of  Mr. 
Webster,  the  life-long  friend  of  his  father.  Once  I  heard  Mr. 
Fessenden  speak  modestly  but  gratefully  of  the  kindly  and  fos 
tering  interest  which  the  great  statesman  bestowed  upon  him 
self  as  a  child  and  during  the  opening  years  of  his  manhood. 
In  the  same  conversation  he  referred  with  regret  to  the  vote 
which  he  had  felt  compelled  to  give  in  the  presidential  conven 
tion  of  1852.  Mr.  Webster,  when  told  that  the  friend  who 
had  so  early  enjoyed  his  affectionate  regards  had  opened 
the  balloting  by  casting  the  vote  of  Maine  for  General 


WILLIAM    PITT    FESSEXDEN.  39 

Scott  rather  than  himself,  after  a  painful  pause,  replied,  refer 
ring  to  the  sentiments  of  his  father,  "  Well,  William  Pitt  Fes- 
senden  has  come  to  his  inheritance  earlier  than  I  anticipated." 
This  implied  an  act  of  ingratitude,  and  was  carried  by  Mr. 
Fessenden  in  sorrow,  not  in  anger,  to  the  grave,  as  his  vote 
had  violated  his  personal  feelings  to  express  the  will  of  his 
State. 

Mr.  Fessenden  had  an  exquisitely  sensitive  nature,  which 
vibrated  to  the  slightest  touch;  and  his  affection,  especially 
his  love  of  kindred  and  friends,  was  as  deep  and  tender  as  a 
woman's.  The  endearing  terms  of  respect  and  love  in  which 
he  was  wont  to  speak  of  his  father  in  the  closing  years  of  his 
life  were  touching  and  beautiful  in  the  extreme ;  and  we  who 
were  present  shall  never  forget  the  moistened  eye,  the  quiver 
ing  lip,  and  the  stifled  utterance  with  which  he  spoke  of  his 
sons,  living  and  dead,  on  the  solitary  occasion  when  he  rose 
here  in  his  own  defense  against  what  he  deemed  an  unjust  im 
putation  of  an  undue  exertion  of  influence  in  their  behalf. 

He  had  little  taste,  I  apprehend,  for  general  society. 
Formal  dinner-parties  and  the  empty  show  and  platitudes  of 
fashionable  life  he  did  not  relish;  but  an  evening  among  his 
friends  was  a  medicine  to  his  public  cares  and  a  pleasure  to 
his  heart  which  he  gladly  welcomed.  He  did  not  covet  a  wide 
circle  of  intimates,  but  followed  the  precept  of  Polonius: 

"  The  friends  thou  hast,  and  their  adoption  tried, 
Grapple  them  to  thy  soul  with  hooks  of  steel." 

He  was  charitable  and  considerate  toward  his  friends,  and 
never  humiliated  or  cast  off  even  the  humblest  by  patronizing 
or  domineering. 

I  doubt  not  his  social  habits  were  modified  somewhat  by  the 
studious  character  of  his  early  professional  life  and  the  precari 
ous  health  of  his  later  years.  He  had  learned  to  husband  the 
time  and  strength  which  too  many  give  to  pleasure  for  the  dis 
charge  of  high  and  grave  public  trusts. 

The  remarkable  intellectual  gifts  of  this  distinguished  man 


40  REMARKS    OF    ME.    PAT  TEE  SON    ON 

were  an  inheritance  from  both  his  parents,  who  were  persons 
of  unusual  mental  vigor ;  but  they  had  been  strengthened  by 
long  and  close  application.  I  once  expressed  to  him  my  sur 
prise  that  he  so  rarely  supported  bis  speeches  by  reference  to 
legal  authorities.  His  reply  was  that  he  had  been  a  close  stu 
dent  for  twenty  years,  while  in  the  practice  of  law,  and  if  his 
matured  opinions  could  not  stand  upon  their  own  merits,  they 
Avere  not  worth  supporting. 

But  his  restless  mental  activity  swept  beyond  the  limits  of 
professional  study  into  the  fields  of  history  and  general  litera 
ture.  With  a  fear  bordering  upon  a  morbid  dread  of  pedantry, 
he  ordinarily  concealed  his  literary  attainments;  but  sometimes, 
in  the  seclusion  of  his  chamber,  he  would  rehearse  a  poem  with 
such  pathos  and  tender  appreciation  of  its  beauties  as  to  sur 
prise  and  entrance  the  privileged  listener.  Once  upon  such  an 
occasion,  when  asked  why  he  did  not  oftener  draw  illustration 
and  ornament  from  the  classic  authors,  he  expressed  a  feeling 
approaching  contempt  for  the  practice  of  interlarding  forensic 
efforts  at  measured  intervals  with  borrowed  scraps  of  poetry. 
The  solid  masonry  of  argument  is  weakened  by  an  attempt  to 
build  into  it  the  cunning  workmanship  of  rhetoric,  and  orig 
inal  poverty  of  style  can  only  be  enriched  by  a  mental  diges 
tion  and  appropriation  of  the  best  intellectual  products  of  the 
past.  An  ignoramus  may  ape  the  learning  of  an  Erasmus,  and 
a  clown  wear  the  glittering  robe  of  a  Sophocles  or  Milton,  but 
the  quick  sense  of  unlettered  men  even  will  penetrate  their  dis 
guises.  Mr.  Fessenden's  honest  hate  of  all  such  false  pretenses 
was  so  intense  as  to  deprive  him  in  a  measure,  1  apprehend,  of 
his  unquestioned  rights  as  a  scholar. 

I  leave  the  task  of  analyzing  his  mental  constitution  and 
political  career  to  others  who  knew  him  longer  and  will  speak 
more  at  length,  but  I  cannot  refrain  from  alluding  to  what 
seemed  to  me  a  marked  peculiarity  of  his  mind.  While  there 
was  nothing  petty  or  technical  in  its  processes,  while  the  grasp 
of  his  intellect  was  large  and  comprehensive,  his  most  striking 


"WILLIAM    PITT    FESSENDEN. 


characteristic  was  a  marvelous  power  of  analysis.  He  was  an 
accomplished  logician,  and  would  have  excelled  as  a  metaphy 
sician.  The  nature  and  minutest  relations  of  every  question 
seemed  to  come  to  him  by  an  instantaneous  intuition.  How 
often  we  have  seen  him  blast  some  fine  theory  by  a  single  word 
as  potent  as  the  spear  of  Ithuriel  ! 

He  had  a  habit  of  resolving  every  proposition  into  its  ele 
ments,  and  of  testing  them  by  the  application  of  first  prin 
ciples  ;  and  such  was  his  command  of  his  faculties  that  he 
could  enter  upon  and  pursue  these  mental  operations  in  the 
whirling  eddy  of  affairs  and  in  the  midst  of  the  most  boister 
ous.  debate.  He  had  the  rare  faculty  of  withdrawing  from  the 
outward  and  objective  into  the  calm  retreats  of  the  reason, 
where  he  would  fabricate,  in  undisturbed  seclusion,  the  close 
argument  which  he  would  launch  forth  in  an  unlooked- 
for  discussion,  all  fresh  and  glowing  from  the  burning  forge 
within. 

A  stranger  might  not  detect  his  purpose,  but  one  who  knew 
him  well  could  prognosticate  from  his  expressive  face  a  coming 
speech  with  the  certainty  of  assurance.  When  up,  he  asked  no 
quarter  and  resorted  to  no  arts  to  establish  his  cause  ;  never 
substituted  his  personal  authority  for  logic,  but  appealed 
always  to  the  reason  and  conscience  of  the  Senate. 

Mr.  Fessenden's  written  efforts  exhibited  the  same  grasp  of 
thought  and  terseness  of  expression  which  we  find  in  his  spoken 
addresses,  though  it  is  evident  he  had  not  the  same  facility  in 
composition  which  he  possessed  in  oral  speech.  The  memor 
able  report  of  the  Joint  Committee  on  Becoustruction,  written  by 
him,  will  hereafter  be  second  to  no  public  document  relating  to 
that  most  important  period  in  the  history  of  our  national  legis 
lation.  It  presents  the  condition  of  affairs  and  the  questions  at 
issue  in  a  form  so  clear  and  compact,  and  enforces  the  duty  of 
Congress  with  arguments  so  apt  and  cogent,  that  it  has  since 
had  the  force  of  a  political  creed  to  the  dominant  party  on  the 
subject  of  reconstruction.  In  this,  as  in  every  public  act  with 


42  REMARKS    OF   ME.    PATTERSON   ON 

which  his  name  is  connected,  he  favors  the  largest  liberty  which 
the  conditions  of  society  will  allow.  His  education,  his  reason, 
his  sympathies,  and  all  the  instincts  of  his  noble  nature  re 
belled  against  every  form  of  human  oppression. 

He  was  sometimes  conservative,  where  his  political  associates 
demanded  reformation,  but  it  was  only  when  convinced  that 
legislation  would  react  against  the  purity  and  permanence  of 
the  Tiepublic  or  to  the  detriment  of  his  countrymen.  His  large 
experience  and  great  familiarity  with  the  history  of  gov 
ernments  sometimes  induced  hesitation  where  others  less  in 
structed  by  the  experience  of  the  past  moved  forward  upon  an 
unobstructed  path  amazed  and  indignant  at  the  scruples  of  the 
statesman.  Possibly  the  comprehensiveness  of  his  views  and 
a  habit  of  thoroughly  and  carefully  considering  subjects  in  all 
their  aspects  dulled  the  "  native  hue  of  his  resolution,"  and 
measurably  unfitted  him  to  be  a  leader  in  revolutionary  times. 
He  was  never  swept  off  his  feet  by  the  force  of  his  indignation 
against  some  solitary  outrage;  never  concentrated  his  gaze 
so  intensely  upon  some  single  good  as  to  lose  sight  of  the  gen 
eral  welfare  of  the  country  in  its  related  interests  as  an  en 
tirety. 

He  seemed  equally  informed  and  equally  interested  in  the 
foreign  and  domestic  affairs  of  the  Government,  in  its  social 
and  political  polities,  and  in  its  questions  of  labor  and  of 
capital. 

In  all  the  long  and  eventful  period  over  which  his  public 
life  extended,  though  connected  intimately  with  every  great 
measure  which  passed  this  body,  his  integrity  and  patriotism 
were  never  questioned.  Bitter  and  widespread  as  was  the 
disappointment  which  attended  his  vote  upon  the  august  trial 
of  the  President  of  the  United  States,  no  Senator  doubted 
that  William  Pitt  Fessendeu  acted  from  a  sense  of  duty  in 
view  of  the  facts  and  the  law  as  they  presented  themselves 
to  his  apprehension.  By  what  mental  process  he  could  reach 
the  conclusion  he  did  was  then,  is  now,  a  mystery  to  many 


WILLIAM    PITT    FESSENDEN.  43 

who  had  battled  by  his  side  in  the  long  agony  of  the  great 
rebellion  and  who  now  cherish  his  memory  with  fraternal 
love.  But  when  we  consider  with  what  infinite  pain  his 
sensitive  and  loving  nature  must  have  rolled  the  bitter 
ness  of  that  defeat  upon  his  life-long  supporters  and 
party  friends,  when  we  recall  the  calm  and  quiet  natural 
ness  and  self-poise  with  which  he  moved  in  and  out  before 
us  while  intense  excitement  rolled  around  this  Hall  and 
deep  anathemas  hung  in  the  air  above  him,  we  must  acknowl 
edge  that  there  was  no  self-seeking,  no  hollow  ambition  in 
that  act,  but  only  invincible  courage  and  the  manliest 
political  virtue.  I  do  not  approve  his  vote,  but  am  com 
pelled  to  commend  the  spirit  of  self-renunciation  with 
which  it  was  given.  That  was  of  the  very  essence  of  the 
loftiest  public  morality. 

One  who  knew  him  intimately  as  an  associate  upon  this 
floor,  and  himself  an  invalid  in  a  foreign  land,  writes  these 
expressive  words : 

"  He  was  the  highest-toned  man  I  ever  knew ;  the  purest  man  I  ever  knew 
in  public  life,  and  the  ablest  public  man  of  my  day." 

It  does  not  fall,  sir,  within  the  scope  of  my  purpose  to  com 
pare  Mr.  Fessenden  with  other  Senators  who  have  passed  to 
their  great  inheritance  of  fame  from  this  arena  of  legislation. 
Some  have  commanded  more  wealth  and  splendor  of  rhetoric ; 
others  have  held  the  Senate  in  the  spell  of  a  more  powerful 
and  fascinating  eloquence;  but  none  have  given  to  the  public 
service  more  intelligence,  a  purer  patriotism,  or  a  loftier  public 
virtue. 

Of  the  last  hours  of  this  distinguished  man  I  know  but 
little.  Beared  and  educated  in  a  neighboring  State,  New 
Hampshire  claims  only  the  honor  of  his  birth.  His  public 
labors  and  great  fame  are  of  the  treasures  of  the  whole 
country;  but  with  pride  his  native  State  enrolls  his  high 
among  the  imperishable  names  which  she  has  given  to  the 
Republic  and  to  mankind. 


44  REMARKS   OF   MR.    DAVIS   ON 

REMARKS   BY  MR.   DAVIS,   OF   KENTUCKY. 

Mr.  President:  I  first  saw  William  Pitt  Fessenden  in  the 
summer  of  1837.  Mr.  Webster  had  been  invited  by  his 
admirers  of  Kentucky  to  visit  that  State,  and  one  of  the 
friends  who  accompanied  him  was  the  young  Fessenden.  The 
great  Senator  presented  him  to  our  people  as  Iris  protege,  and 
as  a  young  man  of  ability  who  had  already  given  high  promise 
of  future  distinction  and  usefulness  to  his  country;  and  Mr. 
Clay  and  his  friends  received  him  with  all  the  consideration 
and  courtesy  due  to  his  rising  merits  and  the  generous  indorse 
ment  of  his  illustrious  friend  and  patron.  The  warm  greeting 
of  the  people  of  Kentucky  and  the  witching  hospitalities  of 
Ashland  made  a  lasting  impression  upon  Mr.  Fessenden. 

Mr.  WTebster  had  been  previously  made  by  him  his  political 
leader  and  instructor,  and  from  that  visit  he  fully  associated 
Mr.  Clay ;  and  he  proved  himself  one  of  the  ablest  and  most 
faithful  of  their  disciples,  firmly  held  the  respect  and  confi 
dence  of  both  to  the  end  of  their  lives,  and  in  his  career  fully 
responded  to  the  high  estimate  and  hopes  which  they  so  early 
formed  of  him. 

I  first  met  Mr.  Fessenden  in  the  House  of  Eepresentatives 
at  the  December  session  of  1841,  and  there  served  with  him 
through  the  Twenty-seventh  Congress.  A  community  of  polit 
ical  principles  and  policy,  and  of  admiration  and  friendship  for 
Mr.  Clay,  brought  Mr.  Fessenden  and  myself  into  close  and 
frequent  contact.  We  often  interchanged  views  upon  political 
and  miscellaneous  subjects,  and  we  formed  and  cherished 
mutually  sentiments  of  respect  and  friendship.  He  was  not 
only  a  young  man  of  eminent  ability  and  attainments,  but  he 
was  warm-hearted,  frank,  sincere,  true,  honorable,  and  emi 
nently  conscientious.  His  health  was  then  good,  and  he  was 
always  bright  and  genial ;  sometimes  he  showed  the  lambent 
play  of  passion  and  fire.  He  was  an  especial  favorite  of  Mr. 
Clay,  and  the  Kentucky  delegation  of  both  Houses ;  they  were 


AVILLIAMI'ITTPESSEKDEN.  45 

proud  that  the  distant  Northeast  had  sent  to  Congress  a  friend 
and  follower  of  their  great  leader,  himself  of  such  rare  merit. 
That  leader  and  all  the  members  of  those  delegations  but 
three — Underwood  and  Andrews  and  Davis — were  borne  to 
their  graves  before  Fessenden.  He  held  firmly  the  true  and 
high  regard  of  those  who  went  before  and  of  those  who 
follow  him. 

Mr.  Fessenden  brought  to  the  study  of  our  Constitution  and 
system  of  government  a  vigorous  and  discriminatiug  intellect, 
an  exalted  conscientiousness  and  moral  sense,  a  pure  and 
fervid  patriotism,  and  great  physical  and  moral  courage ; 
and  he  learned  and  comprehended  and  maintained  their  truth, 
principles,  and  philosophy.  He  knew  and  realized  that  ours 
was  a  government  of  written  language,  of  provisions,  of  prac 
tical  principles,  and  not  of  abstract  ideas ;  that  it  was  formed 
by  the  States,  and  the  people  of  the  States  delegating  by  a 
written  Constitution  to  a  magistracy  to  be  organized  and 
chosen  for  the  United  States  some  enumerated  powers  of  gov 
ernment,  and  retaining  to  themselves  all  others ;  and  that  the 
powers  thus  organized  were  divided  into  legislative,  executive, 
and  judicial,  and  each  class  of  them  vested  in  a  separate  and 
co-ordinate  body  of  magistracy,  intended  and  framed  to  be 
checks  upon  each  other,  and  each  to  guard  and  defend  the 
integrity  of  the  Constitution  and  the  liberties  of  the  people 
against  the  other  departments  and  all  assailants.  He  knew 
that  the  powers  of  the  Government  could  not  be  augmented 
or  altered  or  amended  by  arms  or  war  or  conquest,  but  only  by 
the  authority  and  in  the  mode  prescribed  by  the  Constitution 
itself;  that  all  the  powers  of  Government  which  the  people 
of  the  United  States  intended  to  imbody  and  to  be  exercised 
by  Government  they  had  divided  by  the  Constitution  between 
the  Government  of  the  United  States  and  the  several  States;  and 
that  political  sovereignty  did  not  appertain  to  either  of  those 
governments,  or  to  all  of  them,  but  to  the  people  only.  That 
the  powers  of  the  Government  conferred  upon  it  by  the  Con- 


40  REMARKS    OF   MR.    DAVIS   ON 

stitutiou,  and  the  acts  of  Congress  in  conformity  to  it,  were  the 
supreme  law  of  the  land ;  but  all  other  powers,  authority,  and 
laws  were  of  the  reserved  sovereignty  of  the  people  of  the 
several  States.  Mr.  Fesseuden's  reading  of  the  Constitution 
and  political  philosophy  clearly  taught  him  that  the  Govern 
ment  of  the  United  States  is  built  upon  the  States  and  their 
governments  partly,  and  their  continuance  is  necessary  to  its 
existence  and  operation ;  that  it  might  cease  to  act,  be  dis 
solved,  or  abolished,  and  they  remain  completely  organized 
and  administered. 

After  the  insurrection  had  broken  out  in  such  grand  and 
threatening  proportions,  the  absorbing  object  of  Mr.  Fcssenden 
became  to  be  its  suppression  and  the  holding  of  all  the  States 
together,  fas  aut  nefas,  under  the  same  Government.  He  was 
sincerely  and  strongly  attached  to  the  Union  of  the  States  for 
the  great  and  common  good  which  it  brought  to  them  all,  but 
its  paramount  importance  to  his  own  State  and  section  made 
that  sentiment  with  him  an  intense  passion.  Their  remote 
position  and  natural  poverty  and  weakness  were  such  that  a 
disruption  of  the  Union  would  have  been  to  them  one  of  the 
greatest  calamities  j  and  he  firmly  resolved  that  if  he  could 
prevent  it,  they  should  not  be  left  out  in  the  cold  Northeast. 
He  therefore  gave  his  earnest  support  to  all  the  measures  of 
Mr.  Lincoln's  administration  for  the  suppression  of  the  rebellion. 
His  excited  apprehensions  were  continually  uttering  to  his  soul 
and  sense  the  strong  language  of  the  day :  "the  life  of  the 
nation  has  been  assailed  with  tremendous  forces,  and  by  all 
law  it  has  every  right  of  defense  and  self-preservation."  Such 
was  the  view  which  Mr.  Fessenden  took  of  this  mighty  na 
tional  throe. 

But  with  him  the  war  upon  the  part  of  the  Government  and 
the  adhering  people  of  the  United  States  was  not  and  could 
not  become  a  war  of  subjugation,  of  conquest,  or  of  the  demo 
lition  of  the  States  whose  people  had  risen  in  rebellion,  but  was 
war  only  to  suppress  insurgents  and  rebels  and  to  uphold  and 


WILLIAM    PITT    FESSENDEN.  47 

enforce  the  authority  aud  laws  of  the  United  States;  and 
when  those  ends  were  secured,  guilty  leaders  and  individuals 
might  be  visited  with  personal  punishment  for  violations  of 
la\v ;  but  the  war  could  no  longer  be  legitimately  continued 
for  any  purpose  whatever.  Mr.  Fessenden.  voted  in  the  most 
solemn  form  for  these  propositions : 

"  That  the  present  deplorable  civil  war  has  been  forced  upon  the  country 
by  the  disxiuionists  of  the  southern  States  now  in  revolt  against  the  Con 
stitution  and  Government,  and  in  arms  around  the  Capital ;  that  in 
this  national  emergency  Congress,  banishing  all  feelings  of  mere  passion 
or  resentment,  will  recollect  only  its  duty  to  the  whole  country  ;  that  the 
war  is  not  waged  upon  our  part  in  any  spirit  of  oppression,  nor  for  any 
purpose  of  conquest  or  subjugation,  nor  purpose  of  overthrowing  or  inter 
fering  with  the  rights  or  established  institutions)  of  those  States,  but  to 
defend  and  maintain  the  supremacy  of  the  Constitution  and  to  preserve 
the  Union  with  all  the  dignity,  equality,  and  rights  of  the  several  States 
unimpaired ;  that  as  soon  as  these  objects  are  accomplished  the  war  ought 
to  cease." 

These  noble  words  breathe  the  very  spirit  of  our  constitu 
tional  form  of  government,  and  the  deep,  truthful,  and  earnest 
spirit  of  Mr.  Fessenden,  at  least,  meant  all  they  express.  He 
knew  that  the  Government  of  the  United  States  had  no  power 
under  any  state  of  things  to  abolish  a  State  or  its  government, 
or  to  take  any  action  upon  the  assumption  or  hypothesis  of  such 
destruction.  He  understood  clearly  that  it  was  the  duty  of  the 
United  States  Government  to  uphold,  defend,  and  preserve  the 
States  and  their  governments  as  parts  of  its  own  essential 
machinery;  and  if  his  conservative,  constitutional,  and  enlight 
ened  statesmanship  could  have  prevailed,  the  storm  of  civil  war 
would  have  swept  over  the  country,  and  as  it  passed  away  the 
governments  of  the  United  States  and  every  State  would  spon 
taneously,  by  the  vis  vitce  of  our  system,  have  resumed  their 
proper  positions  and  relations;  and  peace,  order,  prosperity,  and 
liberty  would  soon  have  blessed  again  the  whole  land. 

The  statesmanship  of  Mr.  Fessenden  was  more  moderate  and 
virtuous,  wiser  and  more  patriotic,  than  that  propounded  by 
the  Mountain  faction  of  Congress  and  the  country,  and  which 
his  party  slowly  accepted. 


48  KEMAKKS    OF   ME.    DAVIS    ON 

As  the  contest  raged  with  varying  fortune  the  passions  of 
the  people  became  stirred  to  their  profoundest  depths.  Men  of 
weak  understandings,  of  violent  and  wild  passions,  of  attractive 
but  mischievous  theories,  of  selfish  and  sinister  purposes,  threw 
themselves  everywhere  in  the  lead  and  called  for  the  extremest 
measures.  The  maddened  people  listened  to  them,  accepted 
their  leadership,  were  fascinated  by  their  diabolical  counsels; 
and  after  that  people  had  put  down  the  rebellion  those  archi 
tects  of  revolution  and  ruin,  still  holding  the  country  under  their 
spell,  inaugurated  their  wild  work. 

The  time  had  come  for  passion  to  give  place  to  reason  ;  when 
the  voice  of  reason  must  be  potential  to  save  our  constitutional 
form  of  government.  Mr.  Fessenden,  and  other  men  entertain 
ing  similar  views,  vainly  sought  that  hearing,  even  in  the  Senate 
Chamber.  The  spirits  of  revolution  and  ruin  here,  at  first  few, 
continued  to  grow  in  numbers  and  audacity  as  not  only  to  silence 
Mr.  Fessendeii  and  his  small  band  of  associated  conservative 
Republicans,  but  ultimately  to  hitch  them  on  to  their  triumphal 
car  and  to  drag  them  along  in  their  destructive  career,  even  to 
support  the  overthrow  of  our  Constitution  and  form  of  govern 
ment  by  what  is  called  the  reconstruction  acts  of  Congress. 
Mr.  Fessenden  clearly  .saw  the  abyss  before  him ;  he  was  to 
separate  from  and  turn  upon  his  party  or  take  the  fatal  leap; 
unfortunately  for  his  own  pure  and  enduring  fame,  and  for  his 
country,  he  accepted  the  latter. 

But  Mr.  Fessenden's  conservatism  and  devotion  to  the  Con 
stitution  led  him  into  many  struggles  with  the  excesses  of  his 
party  and  its  more  reckless  leaders.  No  party  man  ever  dis 
sented  oftener  or  more  essentially  from  his  party  or  rebuked 
with  more  ireful  but  manly  scorn  its  arrogant  leaders  who 
abused  its  trust  in  the  promotion  of  their  own  selfish  purposes 
to  the  detriment  of  the  country.  His  separation  from  them  on 
the  impeachment  of  the  late  President  is  a  grand  testimony  in 
support  of  his  correct  comprehension  of  the  Constitution,  of 
his  true  statesmanship,  of  his  stern  sense  of  duty,  his  great 


•WILLIAM   PITT    FESSENDEN.  49 

moral  firmness,  and  his  exalted  patriotism.  The  muse  of  his 
tory  will  write  this  chapter  of  his  life  in  characters  that  will 
never  fade;  it  will  be  a  more  imperishable  monument  than 
marble  or  brass,  and  upon  it  will  be  inscribed:  "The  ablest  and 
purest  statesman  of  New  England  in  his  day  and  generation." 


REMAEKS  OF  MR.  VICKERS,  OF  MARYLAND. 

Mr.  President:  I  have  listened  with  melancholy  interest  to 
the  recital  of  the  prominent  traits  in  the  character  and  history 
of  a  deceased  Senator  and  to  the  eloquent  eulogies  that  have 
been  pronounced  upon  him.  Those  who  knew  him  best,  had 
served  longer  with  him  in  public  life,  and  enjoyed  more  inti 
mately  his  social  communion,  can  more  fully  appreciate  his  pub 
lic  character  and  intellectual  and  moral  worth.  My  acquaint 
ance  with  him  was  recent  and  limited,  and  my  opportunities 
less,  of  forming  a  correct  estimate  of  his  ability  and  merits; 
but  his  long  and  eminent  career  in  the  public  service  and  his 
conceded  talents  made  a  favorable  impression  upon  my  mind 
long  before  my  induction  into  public  life.  After  my  admis 
sion  into  this  body  I  marked  his  course  and  listened  to  him  in 
debate  with  more  than  ordinary  attention.  To  me  he  appeared 
in  some  sense  the  Nestor  of  the  Senate.  His  grave  and 
thoughtful  brow  and  dignified  mien  produced  sentiments  of 
veneration,  while  his  words  made  a  deep  impression.  More 
than  once  I  privately  appealed  to  him  to  speak  more  audibly, 
for  on  my  side  of  the  Chamber  we  desired  to  distinctly  hear 
and  understand  him.  He  told  me  that  his  habit  was  acquired 
in  the  old  Senate  Chamber,  where  any  one  could  be  heard 
without  difficulty. 

I  consider  it  no  disparagement  to  Senators  to  say  that  he 
was  one  of  the  most  accomplished  and  logical  debaters  among 
us.  He  was  also,  what  is  more  rare,  a  good  listener,  and  did 


50  REMARKS    OF   MR.    VICKERS    ON 

not  often  occupy  the  floor.  It  was  only  upon  occasions  of  im 
portance  that  be  rose  to  a  discussion,  and  when  he  finished  the 
debate  frequently  was  virtually  ended ;  the  strong  points  were 
seized  and  analyzed,  and  when  they  had  passed  through  the 
crucible  of  his  understanding  the  pure  metal  was  easily  dis 
cerned.  Although  I  differed  with  him  on  some  subjects  of 
national  moment,  yet  when  I  considered  his  education,  section, 
habits,  and  associations,  I  could  not  doubt  his  sincerity  or  his 
patriotism.  The  materials  which  a  life  in  the  nation's  service 
had  enabled  him  to  collect  he  had  an  aptness  and  facility  in 
using  which  gave  him  great  advantage  in  discussion.  His 
efforts  had  the  appearance  of  fluency  and  ease,  while  his  com 
mand  of  appropriate  expressions  impressed  the  minds  of  his 
hearers  with  his  great  ability.  His  style  was  not  ornate  or  dif 
fuse,  but  he  possessed  the  power  of  concentration  and  force,  as 
well  as  of  classical  taste,  that  outweighed  the  metaphorical 
and  beautiful.  If  true  eloquence  consists  in  great  will,  great 
courage,  great  intellect,  and  the  power  that  controls  the  judg 
ment,  then  he  was  an  orator  of  the  first  class;  or  if  to  be 
worth  much,  speech  must  begin  like  a  river  and  flow  and 
widen  and  deepen  until  the  end.  he  possessed  that  attribute 
also.  On  some  occasions,  being  warmed  by  the  subject  and 
circumstances,  he  spoke  with  an  animation  and  cogency  which 
exhibited  his  higher  powers  of  argumentative  eloquence, 
though  ordinarily  Homer's  description  of  the  oratory  of 
Ulysses  might  be  partially  applied: 

"But  when  be  speaks  what  elocution  flows, 
Soft  as  the  fleeces  of  descending  snows." 

It  may  be  said  of  him  what  was  once  remarked  of  a  dis 
tinguished  French  orator,  that  he  said  just  what  he  meant  to 
say,  and  like  an  expert  navigator  he  steered  his  words  and 
his  ideas  through  the  shoals  which  beset  him  on  every  side, 
not  only  without  going  to  wreck,  but  without  ever  running 
aground.  In  a  word,  he  was  an  experienced  and  wise  states- 


WILLIAM    PITT    FESSENDEN. 


man,  an  eloquent  and  methodical  debater,  with  powers  of  rea 
soning  rarely  equaled  or  excelled. 

On  a  momentous  and  memorable  occasion  he  uttered  senti 
ments  which,  like  jewels  of  brilliancy  and  value,  will  be  treas 
ured  by  the  virtuous  and  the  patriotic,  and  were  worthy  of 
the  Fathers  of  the  Republic.  He  said: 

"A  desire  to  be  consistent  would  not  excuse  a  violation  of  my  oath 
to  do  impartial  justice.  lu  the  words  of  Lord  Eldeu,  I  take  no  notice  of 
what  is  passing  out  of  doors,  because  I  am  supposed  constitutionally 
not  to  he  acquainted  with  it;  and  I  should  consider  myself  undeserving 
the  confidence  of  that  just  and  intelligent  people  who  imposed  upon 
me  this  great  responsibility,  and  unworthy  of  a  place  among  honorable 
men,  if  for  any  fear  of  public  reprobation  and  for  the  sake  of  securing 
popular  favor  I  should  disregard  the  convictions  of  my  judgment  and  my 
conscience." 

These  declarations  were  worthy  of  a  Roman  senator  in  the 
palmiest  days  of  the  Republic;  they  are  eminently  worthy 
of  an  American  Senator  and  jurist,  and  indicate  the  sterling 
worth  and  purity  of  the  man.  No  prouder  monument  need  be 
erected  to  his  fame.  His  firmness  and  decision  under  the  try 
ing  circumstances  reminded  me  of  the  reply  of  the  noble  Duke 
of  Somerset  to  James  II  of  England,  who  had  told  him  that 
he  was  above  the  law  and  would  make  him  fear  him:  "Your 
Majesty  may  be  above  the  law,  but  I  am  not,  and  while  I  obey 
the  law  I  fear  nothing." 

But  he  has  left  us.  When  I  last  saw  him  he  was  in  apparent 
health,  and  filled  his  place  and  performed  his  duties  with  his 
accustomed  fidelity.  A  few  short  months  brought  us  the  tele 
graphic  information  that  he  was  sick,  ill,  dead!  Upon  my 
mind  it  fell  like  an  electric  shock,  and  I  could  scarcely  realize 
its  sadness  and  solemnity.  The  Bible  informs  us  that  some 
"shall  die  like  men  and  fall  like  one  of  the  princes."  He  has 
verified  it,  for  a  great  man  has  fallen,  and  William  Pitt  Fes- 
senden  sleeps  with  his  fathers;  but  his  usefulness  and  reputa 
tion  survive,  and  the  historian  will  pay  an  exalted  tribute  to 
his  memory.  Let  us  be  admonished,  Senators,  that  we,  too,  are 
frail  and  mortal  and  may  soon  be  called  to  pay  the  same  debt 


52  REMARKS    OF   MR.    HAMLTN    ON 

of  our  common  nature:  that  we  owe  high  duties  to  the  state, 
those  of  charity  and  forbearance  to  each  other,  and  a  responsi 
bility  to  the  great  Euler  of  the  Universe  for  the  faithful  dis 
charge  of  every  public  and  private  duty. 


REMARKS  BY  MR.    HAMLIN,  OF  MAINE. 

Mr.  President:  The  truthful  and  appropriate  words  which 
have  been  spoken  by  Senators  in  honor  and  memory  of  my 
deceased  colleague  have  left  but  little  to  be  added.  So  full 
and  generous  have  been  their  expressions  of  his  distil) guished 
ability,  his  services  in  the  councils  of  the  nation,  and  his  high 
moral  worth,  that  necessity  would  seem  to  require  no  word 
from  me ;  but  duty  and  inclination  impel  me  to  pay  a  brief  but 
sincere  tribute  to  his  memory  and  his  worth.  That  he  has 
been  thus  appreciated  by  the  Senators  with  whom  he  served  is 
gratifying  to  the  people  of  the  State  he  represented,  which 
State  he  so  highly  honored,  as  it  had  honored  him,  and  doubly 
gratifying  will  it  be  to  his  family,  relatives,  and  friends  who 
shared  most  intimately  his  confidence  and  friendship,  and  who 
most  deeply  feel  and  mourn  his  loss. 

My  estimate  of  my  late  colleague  has  been  formed  by  long- 
years  of  association  with  him.  I  was  a  student  at  law  in  his 
office,  and  practiced  with  him  for  a  time  in  the  same  courts. 
We  served  together  as  members  of  the  Legislature  of  our 
State,  and  for  many  years  were  together  Senators  here.  The 
purity  of  his  life  challenges  and  commands  our  admiration  and 
furnishes  an  example  for  all  to  imitate. 

He  was  alike  eminent  in  his  profession  of  law  and  in  the 
Senate,  standing  in  the  foremost  ranks  of  each.  I  do  not  deem 
it  necessary  or  even  appropriate  to  attempt  a  reference  in  detail, 
after  so  much  has  been  said  by  Senators  as  to  his  varied  ability 
or  specific  public  acts;  it  could  be  but  a  repetition,  The  im 
press  of  his  mind  is  indelibly  stamped  upon  the  laws  and  policy 


WILLIAM    PITT    FESSENDEN. 


of  the  country.  As  a  parliamentary  debater  he  was  without  a 
superior,  and  in  one  regard  without  a  peer. 

He  lived  and  acted  at  the  most  important  period  of  our 
country's  history,  when  the  events  of  a  century  were  com 
pressed  into  a  single  year  and  requiring  minds  of  no  ordinary 
character  to  deal  with  and  give  them  direction.  It  was  a  time, 
too,  that  taught  us  all  more  clearly  that  the  duties  and 
victories  of  civil  life  are  as  comprehensive  and  important  as 
those  of  arms,  and  that  the  distinguished  statesman  who  aids 
in  wisely  directing  the  councils  of  the  nation,  should  at  least 
be  held  in  as  cherished  remembrance  as  he  who  successfully 
commands  our  armies  in  the  field  in  time  of  war.  Their 
several  duties  and  responsibilities  are  unlike,  but  equally  im 
portant.  Indeed,  whatever  may  be  the  public  estimate,  in  my 
judgment  the  eminent  statesmen,  prominent  in  legislation,  who 
give  form  and  shape  to  the  laws  that  govern,  and  who  impress 
their  genius  and  ability  upon  them,  occupy  a  position  as  import 
ant  —  may  I  not  say  of  higher  importance  —  than  he  who  exe 
cutes  or  gives  them  construction.  Such  I  believe  is  the 
position  which  a  dispassionate  public  judgment,  such  the  posi 
tion  that  the  historian  will  assign  my  late  distinguished 
colleague,  who  in  the  inscrutable  providence  of  God  has  been 
summoned  from  this  earth,  and  whose  manly  form  now  reposes 
with  the  drapery  of  the  grave  around  it. 

Mr.  President,  there  are  events  connected  with  the  Senate 
which  the  solemnities  of  the  occasion  seem  to  impress  upon  me 
with  peculiar  force,  and  to  which  I  may  appropriately  refer.  I 
run  my  eye  over  the  Senate  Chamber  to-day,  and  of  all  the  men 
which  constituted  the  body  upon  my  entrance  into  it  as  a  mem 
ber  but  a  single  one  —  but  a  single  one  now  remains  with  me. 
That  one  is  my  honored  friend,  the  Senator  from  Pennsylvania 
who  sits  nearest  to  me,  [Mr.  Cameron;]  and  it  is  no  slight  com 
pensation  for  the  annoyance  incident  to  public  life  to  know  that 
intimate  and  most  friendly  relations  which  were  then  formed  in 
all  changes  and  antagonisms  of  public  life  have  never  for  one 


54  ADOPTION    OF    THE    RESOLUTIONS. 

moment  been  disturbed.  Could  we  have  been  transferred  from 
that  time  to  the  present,  from  the  Senate  as  it  then  was  to  the 
Senate  as  it  now  is,  how  startling  would  be  the  change!  We 
would  find  ourselves  in  association  with  those  who  would  be 
strangers  to  us.  It  teaches  a  moral  that  all  may  heed. 

During  the  period  of  time  referred  to,  the  Seriate  has  certainly 
been  graced  by  many  of  the  most  eminent  and  distinguished 
American  Senators.  Clay  with  his  clarion  voice  and  fervid 
eloquence ;  Calhoun  with  his  captivating  manner  and  subtle 
metaphysics;  Webster  with  his  words  of  masterly  power; 
Bcnton  with  his  comprehensive  knowledge  of  the  legislation  of 
the  country,  and  an  indomitable  will ;  Douglas  with  an  earnest 
ness  and  courage  to  meet  and  if  possible  to  overcome  all  obsta 
cles  in  his  way ;  and  Collamer  with  his  plausibility  to  persuade 
and  his  learning  and  his  logic  to  convince;  and  Cassand  Clay- 
ton,  are  certainly  some  of  the  Senators  whose  names  stand 
highest  upon  the  roll  of  senatorial  fame.  Their  names,  and 
others  that  might  be  designated,  will  be  remembered  while  the 
Eepublic  or  its  history  shall  exist ;  and  to  this  list  is  now  to  be 
added  the  name  of  Fessenden,  my  late  colleague.  There  it  will 
remain  imperishable  as  one  of  the  great  American  Senators. 

ADOPTION  OF  THE  RESOLUTIONS. 

The  resolutions  which  had  been  submitted  by  Mr.  MORRILL, 
of  Maine,  were  unanimously  agreed  to. 

On  motion  of  Mr.  HAMLIN,  of  Maine,  as  a  further  mark  of 
respect  to  the  memory  of  the  deceased,  the  Senate  adjourned. 


PROCEEDINGS 


MR.  GEORGE  C.  GORHAM,  the  Secretary  of  the  Senate, 
appeared  at  the  bar  and  said  :  I  am  directed  to  communicate 
to  the  House  of  Representatives  information  of  the  death  of 
Hon.  William  Pitt  Fessenden,  late  a  Senator  in  Congress  from 
the  State  of  Maine,  with  the  proceedings  of  the  Senate  thereon. 

The  SPEAKER.    The  proceedings  of  the  Senate  will  be  read. 

The  Clerk  read  as  follows : 

IN  SENATE  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES, 

December,  14,  1869. 

Eesohed,  That  the  Senate  receive  with  deep  regret  the  announcement  of 
the  death  of  WILLIAM  PITT  FESSENDEN,  late  a  member  of  this  body. 

Resolved,  That  the  members  of  the  Senate  will  manifest  their  respect  for 
the  memory  of  the  deceased  by  wearing  the  usual  badge  of  mourning. 

llcsohed,  That  these  proceedings  be  communicated  to  the  House  of  Eep- 
resentatives. 


REMARKS  BY  MR.  LYNCH,  OF  MAINE. 

Mr.  Speaker:  The  message  just  received  from  the  Senate 
announces  that  another  of  the  distinguished  statesmen  of  the 
country  has  passed  away ;  and  although  the  sad  event  occurred 
many  months  since,  and  has  been  heralded  to  the  country  by 
the  pulpit  and  the  press,  it  is  eminently  proper  that  in  these 
halls,  where  he  has  exerted  such  a  controlling  influence,  and  at 
this  time  when  on  assembling  together  we  miss  his  presence 
from  our  councils  and  begin  to  realize  the  nation's  loss,  we 
should  pause  from  our  labors,  and,  consecrating  a  day  to  his 
memory,  pay  a  tribute  to  his  virtues. 


56  REMAKES   OF   MR.    LYNCH   ON 

For  myself,  sir,  I  have  never  so  fully  recognized  the  loss  sus 
tained  by  our  country,  my  State  and  my  own  immediate  con 
stituents,  as  since  I  returned  to  my  labors  here ;  for  although  he 
was  my  neighbor  and  my  friend,  yet  it  was  during  the  sessions 
of  Congress  that  I  was  most  closely  and  intimately  connected 
with  him.  Indeed,  since  his  election  to  the  Senate,  it  was  in 
discharge  of  his  public  duties  here  that  most  of  his  active  life 
was  spent. 

At  home  he  lived  quite  retired,  passing  most  of  his  time  with 
his  family  and  in  his  garden  and  library,  mingling  but  little 
with  society  and  avoiding  all  excitement.  His  close  application 
to  his  duties  here  during  the  sessions  of  Congress,  which  were 
never  interrupted  except  by  sickness  while  he  Avas  a  member  of 
the  Senate,  made  such  draughts  on  his  naturally  feeble  constitu 
tion  as  to  render  it  necessary  for  him  to  recuperate  mentally 
and  physically  during  the  recess. 

A  slight  departure  from  his  usual  course  in  this  regard 
probably  induced  the  attack  which  terminated  his  life.  His 
sickness  lasted  but  a  few  days,  during  which  time  the  hopes 
and  fears  of  his  friends  alternated,  until  the  morning  of  Sep 
tember  7,  when  he  began  gradually  to  sink  away. 

"  His  sufferings  ended  with  the  day, 

Yet  lived  he  at  its  close, 
And  breathed  the  long,  long  night  away 
In  statue-like  repose ! 

"  But  when  the  sun  in  all  his  state 

Illumed  the  eastern  skies, 
He  passed  through  glory's  morning  gate 
And  walked  in  Paradise." 

He  died  in  Portland  at  his  home,  which  he  loved  so  well, 
and  surrounded  by  his  family  and  friends,  who  were  so  dear  to 
him,  at  twenty  minutes  past  six  o'clock  on  the  morning  of 
September  8. 

Mr.  Fessenden,  though  born  in  the  State  of  New  Hamp 
shire,  (October  16,  1806,)  was  from  his  earliest  childhood  a 
resident  of  Maine.  In  that  State  he  received  his  early  train- 


WILLIAM    PITT    FESSENDEN.  57 

ing  and  Ms  collegiate  education,  and  it  was  in  the  public 
service  of  that  State  that  he  acquired  reputation  as  an  able 
statesman. 

Admitted  to  the  bar  before  he  had  attained  his  majority,  he 
rose  rapidly  in  his  profession,  and  at  the  time  of  his  with 
drawal  from  it  into  political  life  had  no  superior  at  the  bar 
in  Maine,  and  very  few  in  the  country.  Candid,  straightfor 
ward,  and  direct,  clear  in  his  statements  and  logical  in  his 
arguments,  he  had  great  influence  with  court  and  jury ;  and  it 
was  these  qualities  which,  brought  into  exercise  in  the  forum 
of  the  Senate,  gave  him  such  commanding  influence  in  that 
body. 

He  loved  his  profession,  and  left  it  reluctantly  for  the 
more  exciting  and  arduous  duties  of  political  life.  Iden 
tified  with  the  Whig  party,  which,  being  in  a  minority 
in  the  State  and  nation,  felt  the  necessity  for  putting 
forth  its  ablest  champions,  he  found  it  difficult  to  resist 
the  demands  made  upon  him  by  his  political  friends; 
and  in  1831  he  was  elected  one  of  the  representatives 
from  the  city  of  Portland  to  the  Legislature  of  Maine; 
and  although  the  youngest  member,  he  soon  rose  to  dis 
tinction  in  that  body  and  in  the  State. 

It  was  during  this  period  that  the  United  States  Bank  ques 
tion  was  agitating  Congress  and  the  country,  and  resolutions 
were  introduced  into  the  Legislature  instructing  the  Senators 
in  Congress  from  Maine  to  vote  against  re-chartering  that 
institution.  Mr.  Fessenden  made  a  speech  against  the  resolu 
tions,  which  is  remarkable  not  only  for  that  peculiar  power 
which  distinguished  his  subsequent  efforts,  but  more  remark 
able  still  as  embodying  his  views  of  the  duties  and  responsibil 
ities  of  a  Senator  of  the  United  States,  and  as  laying  down 
those  opinions  and  principles  which  governed  his  own  action  in 
that  high  position.  Some  passages  of  this  speech  so  strikingly 
illustrate  his  character,  and  shed  so  much  light  upon  his 
course  as  a  public  man,  that  I  cannot  forbear  quoting  them 


58  REMARKS    OF   MR.    LYNCH    ON 

here.     Speaking  of  the  proposition   to  instruct   Senators  in 
Congress  by  State  Legislatures,  he  said  : 

"  They  have  much  better  opportunities  to  give  the  question  full,  fair,  and 
thorough  examination  than  we  can  possibly  possess.  They,  too,  are  acting 
under  the  sanction  of  an  oath,  and  they  have,  therefore,  stronger  induce 
ments  to  give  this  matter,  as  they  are  to  pass  upon  it,  such  an  investigation 
as  it  deserves. 

"  Sir,  I  have  no  doubt  that  our  Senators  in  Congress  entertain  these  views. 
I  should  hesitate  to  believe  that,  in  the  discharge  of  their  high  and  import 
ant  trust,  they  would,  on  questions  of  great  importance  to  our  whole 
country,  yield  up  their  honest  convictions  and  violate  their  oaths,  simply  to 
comply  with  the  directions  of  any  set  of  men  whatever.  I  am  free  to  con 
fess,  sir,  that  I  would  not  thus  act.  On  questions  of  mere  local  interests, 
interests  connected  with  themselves  alone,  my  constituents  hav.c  a  right  to 
instruct  me,  and  I  am  bound  to  obey  their  instructions. 

"  But,  sir,  on  questions  of  general  interest  I  have  a  higher  obligation ;  I 
am  bound  to  examine  and  judge  for  myself,  to  form  my  own  opinions,  and  to 
act  upon  them,  and  them  only,  on  a  question  of  this  kind.  Sir,  did  I  know 
that  the  opinions  of  every  one  of  my  constituents  differed  from  my  own,  if 
I  acted  at  all,  I  would  act  according  to  my  own  honest  convictions  of  right, 
were  it  directly  in  their  teeth.  Those  whom  I  represent,  sir,  would  despise 
me  if  I  acted  otherwise.  No,  sir ;  I  might  in  such  a  case  resign  my  office, 
but  I  would  never  violate  the  dictates  of  my  own  conscience.  I  am  willing 
to  be  the  servant  of  the  people,  but  I  never  will  be  their  slave." 

How  clearly  and  distinctly  these  words  foreshadow  the  last 
prominent  act  of  his  public  life. 

If  his  constituents  Avere  disappointed  in  his  vote  on  the 
impeachment  trial,  they  were  at  least  fairly  warned  of  the 
principles  which  would  govern  the  man  whom  they  chose  to 
represent  them.  Differing  with  him  in  his  vote  on  this,  ques 
tion,  believing  then  as  I  still  believe  he  reached  wrong  conclu 
sions,  I  cannot  too  strongly  express  my  admiration  of  the  high 
motives  by  which  he  was  governed.  And,  sir,  whatever  differ 
ence  of  opinion  may  exist  in  regard  to  the  duty  of  Eepresenta- 
tives  of  States  or  districts  to  obey  the  expressed  will  of  their 
constituents,  all  who  appreciate  true  manhood  must  admire 
the  character  of  him  who  in  youth  avowed  these  manly  princi 
ples,  and  consistently  and  courageously  lived  up  to  them 
against  whatever  temptation  to  the  day  of  his  death. 

The  same  high  tone  is  characteristic  of  the  man  who  in  early 
life  spoke  these  brave  words ;  and  this  character  of  perfect  integ- 


WILLIAM   PITT    FESSENDEN.  59 

rity  and  conscientiousness  impressed  itself  upon  all  with  whom 
Mr.  Fessenden  came  in  contact.  His  speeches  were  never  sensa 
tional;  clothed  in  plain,  simple  language,  they  were  severe  in 
their  logic,  apt  and  pointed  in  their  application,  and  wonderfully 
effective  in  their  influence.  He  seemed  to  follow  the  maxim  of 
Solomon,  that  "  it  is  an  honor  for  a  man  to  cease  from  strife, 
but  every  fool  will  be  meddling ;"  for  he  never  dissipated  his 
power  in  angry  wrangling,  or  in  stump  speeches  on  current 
topics,  but  reserved  his  strength  for  emergencies  when  it  was 
required;  and  however  sudden  and  important  the  occasion,  he 
was  always  found  ready  and  fully  armed.  Making  no  preten 
sions  to  oratorial  powers,  and  seldom  speaking  to  popular 
assemblies,  yet  few  could  command  closer  attention,  or  at  times 
rouse  an  audience  to  a  higher  pitch  of  enthusiasm. 

He  never  spoke  unless  he  had  something  to  say,  and  never 
electioneered  for  the  votes  of  his  constituents  by  talking  bun 
combe  from  the  floor  in  Congress,  or  writing  it  for  newspaper 
publication.  The  small  arts  of  the  demagogue  he  disdained  to 
use.  He  never  flattered  the  people  to  obtain  their  votes. 

"  He  \voulcl  not  flatter  Neptune  for  his  trident, 
Or  Jove,  for  his  power  to  thunder." 

He  had  great  influence  in  the  body  of  which  he  was  a  mem 
ber;  which  is  proof  that  he  was  really  a  great  man,  for  none 
other  could  acquire  and  retain  the  influence  which  he  exerted 
over  such  a  body  of  men  as  compose  the  Senate  of  the  United 
States. 

This  influence  was  largely  due  to  the  confidence  which  his 
high  character  inspired  in  those  with  whom  he  was  associated. 
Every  one  felt  that  whether  Mr.  Fesseuden  was  right  or  not,  he 
believed  himself  to  be  so,  and  could  give  a  reason  for  the  faith 
that  was  in  him  in  a  plain,  simple,  quiet  way,  that  commanded 
respect,  if  it  did  not  produce  conviction.  He  did  not  seek  to 
persuade  and  argue  people  into  his  way  of  thinking.  He  only 
stated  his  convictions  and  the  reasons  for  them,  leaving  those 
he  addressed  to  decide  for  themselves  on  the  issues  presented. 


(JO  KEMAKKS    OF    MR.    LYNCH   ON 

He  had  great  order,  not  only  in  all  business  matters,  but  in 
his  mental  processes.  Whether  in  his  library  at  home,  or  in 
his  committee-room  or  private  apartments  here,  this  same  order 
was  observed.  There  were  no  piles  of  books  and  manuscripts, 
no  confusion  of  papers,  but  all  the  surroundings  were  clear, 
clean,  and  orderly  as  the  mind  that  presided  over  them.  He 
kept  himself  unencumbered  of  all  waste  material,  weeding  out 
and  rejecting  everything  superfluous,  and  retaining  only  the 
useful.  Before  making  a  speech  he  thought  out  and  thoroughly 
analyzed  his  subject  until  his  mind  had  reached  a  distinct  con 
clusion  by  logical  and  correct  methods,  and  then  stated  in  the 
simplest  language  what  that  conclusion  was,  and  how  he  had 
himself  arrived  at  it.  His  construction  of  a  speech  was  like 
the  building  of  Solomon's  temple ;  you  heard  neither  the  sound 
of  the  hammer  nor  saw  the  debris  of  the  workmen,  but  every 
stone  was  taken  from  the  quarry  ready  fitted  to  its  place,  and 
the  building  rose  silently  and  rapidly  from  foundation  to  cap 
stone.  He  was  a  man  of  exceedingly  sound  judgment,  exam 
ined  everything  brought  to  his  attention  critically  before  he 
decided  upon  it,  and  never  signed  any  paper  without  carefully 
reading  its  contents,  and  when  he  did  not  fully  agree  to  its 
statements,  qualifying  his  approval. 

Mr.  Fessenden  first  took  his  seat  in  the  Senate  of  the  United 
States  in  1854,  when  the  agitation  of  the  slavery  question  had 
nearly  reached  its  culmination.  He  immediately  took  a  promi 
nent  part  in  the  senatorial  discussion  on  this  subject,  resisting 
manfully  the  aggressions  of  the  slave  power,  and  repelled  with 
spirit  the  insolence  of  its  advocates,  teaching  them  that  they 
were  engaged  in  a  conflict  in  which  there  were  "  blows  to  take 
as  well  as  blows  to  give."  It  was  in  these  discussions  that  Mr. 
Fessenden's  talents  as  a  ready  and  forcible  debater  were  most 
conspicuously  displayed ;  and  with  all  his  reputation  for  con 
servatism,  an  examination  of  his  record  will  show  that  in 
the  great  contest  in  which  slavery  was  destroyed,  while 
freedom  had  fiercer  and  more  violent  champions,  it  had 


W.ILJ,IAM   PITTFESSENDEN. 


none  steadier,  truer,  or  more  reliable  than  William  Pitt 
Fessenden. 

After  a  thorough  examination  of  his  congressional  record,  I 
cannot  find  where,  from  the  beginning  to  the  end  of  this  con 
flict,  from  the  abrogation  of  the  Missouri  compromise  to  the 
last  act  of  reconstruction,  he  ever  yielded  one  essential  point  in 
favor  of  slavery.  He  was  not  a  reformer,  not  a  man  to  attack 
existing  evils  in  the  state  ;  but  rather  inclined  to  suffer  from 
them  while  endurable  than  to  disturb  the  existing  forms  by 
which  they  were  protected.  But  he  resisted  all  new  conces 
sions  to  slavery,  and  when  he  saw  that  the  safety  of  the  nation 
demanded  its  destruction  he  aimed  to  do  the  wrork  thoroughly 
and  effectively. 

In  the  debate  on  the  admission  of  the  Senators  from  Arkansas 
in  June,  1864,  he  stated  the  foundation  principles  which  guided 
the  policy  adopted  for  reconstructing  the  rebel  States.  This 
not  only  illustrates  his  habits  of  reflection  on  questions  of  pub 
lic  importance  long  before  they  arise,  but  a  comparison  of  this 
speech  with  the  report  of  the  Committee  on  reconstruction 
will  show  a  remarkable  similarity  of  thought  and  purpose,  and 
that  report  has  been  essentially  the  basis  of  this  great  work  — 
the  most  difficult  and  important  ever  committed  to  a  legislative 
body  —  which  is  now  happily  near  its  completion. 

Without  according  to  the  common  judgment,  popular  sym 
pathies,  and  therefore  not  what  would  be  called  a  popular  man 
with  the  people,  he  was  nevertheless  six  times  elected  to  the 
Legislature  of  Maine;  once  —  in  1840  —  elected  to  this  House 
from  a  district  in  which  his  party  was  in  a  minority  ;  and  was 
three  times  elected  to  the  Senate  of  the  United  States  —  in  1854, 
1855,  and  1859  —  by  the  unanimous  vote  of  his  party  in  the 
State  Legislature,  attesting  the  high  appreciation  by  the  people 
of  his  State  of  his  pre-eminent  abilities  as  a  statesman  and  of 
his  sterling  qualities  as  a  man. 

As  chairman  of  the  Finance  Committee  of  the  Senate  he  took 
a  leading  part  in  shaping  the  legislation  that  provided  the 


EEMAEKS    OF    MR.    LYNCH    ON 


"sinews  of  Avar"  during  the  rebellion,  and  although  his  natural 
conservatism,  often  led  him  to  hesitate  to  adopt  some  of  the 
financial  measures  which  the  emergency  required,  his  doubts 
always  yielded  to  the  necessities  of  the  case,  and  he  maintained 
from  the  first  the  right  of  the  Government  to  adopt  any  measures 
however  arbitrary  to  preserve  its  existence.  At  a  most  criti 
cal  period  of  the  war,  July  6,  18G4,  after  having  performed  the 
arduous  duties  of  his  position  in  the  Senate  for  nearly  eight 
months,  worn  down  with  fatigue  and  suffering  from  physical 
exhaustion,  he  was  called  by  President  Lincoln  to  the  Cabinet 
as  Secretary  of  the  Treasury.  And  as  he  expressed  himself  in 
a  letter  to  a  friend  at  that  time:  "At  whatever  risk  of  health 
or  reputation,  I  am  compelled  to  accept.  I  dare  not  take  the 
responsibility  of  declining  at  such  a  crisis." 

Making  no  pretensions  as  a  financier,  and  having  no  particu 
lar  policy  or  theories  on  the  subject  of  finance,  he  had  what  in 
such  a  crisis  was  vastly  better  than  either — a  character  to 
inspire  that  confidence  which  is  the  soul  of  credit,  and  an  abid 
ing  faith  in  the  ability  and  determination  of  the  American  peo 
ple  to  sustain  their  Government.  With  an  apparent  stagna 
tion  in  military  movements,  the  people,  heart-sick  with  "hope 
deferred,"  an  army  to  be  recruited,  maintained,  and  paid  ;  with 
demands  pressing  for  payment  on  an  empty  Treasury,  few  men 
ever  assumed  weightier  responsibilities,  and  none  ever  met  such 
more  manfully,  or  discharged  them  more  honestly  and  success 
fully.  He  immediately  put  himself  in  communication  with  the 
capitalists  of  the  country  by  calling  a  meeting  of  bankers  at 
New  York,  stated  to  them  in  a  straightforward,  business-like 
manner  the  financial  condition  and  needs  of  the  Government, 
his  desire  to  gather  opinions  from  all  sources,  and  listen  to 
advice  from  any  who  might  offer  it. 

Although  this  meeting  tended  to  strengthen  the  confidence 
of  capitalists  in  the  new  Secretary  and  to  improve  the  national 
credit,  as  was  seen  in  the  immediate  decline  in  gold,  it  failed  to 
X>rovide  the  needed  funds.  His  next  step  was  to  issue  an  appeal 


WILLIAM    PITT    FESSEN  DEN. 


to  the  people  of  the  United  States,  reminding  them  that  it  was 
their  war  ;  that  they  had  proclaimed  it  and  carried  it  on  thus 
far;  that  if  they  now  contributed  their  money  to  continue  it, 
the  end  was  not  far  distant,  as  the  rebels  were  nearly  exhausted. 
If  they  kept  their  money  for  speculations  and  gold  gambling 
they  might  make  larger  immediate  incomes  for  the  time,  but 
they  would  lose  that  without  which  no  investments  would  have 
any  value  —  the  prosperity  of  our  institutions  and  the  safety  of 
the  nation.  The  response  to  the  appeal  was  electric.  Money, 
which  had  been  locked  up,  came  forth  into  the  market,  and  the 
wheels  of  trade  began  to  move  again.  The  press  of  the  country 
seconded  the  efforts  of  the  Secretary  with  its  powerful  influence, 
and  the  $200,000,000  authorized  by  law  were  speedily  poured 
into  the  Treasury. 

Mr.  Fessenden's  idea  was  that  the  cause  could  not  be  gained 
unless  the  people  were  determined  to  gain  it,  and  an  appeal  to 
their  purses  would  be  -the  shortest  road  to  ascertain  the  true 
extent  of  their  energies  and  determination.  At  the  beginning' 
of  his  administration  of  the  Treasury  in  July,  1864.  gold  was 
270  to  280.  When  in  March,  1865,  he  left  it  to  resume  his  seat 
in  the  Senate,  it  had  fallen  to  198,  and  the  national  credit  was 
correspondingly  improved.  I  know  it  is  said  that  financial  suc 
cess  during  the  war  depended  upon  military  success,  but  is  it 
not  equally  true  that  military  success  depended  upon  financial 
success1? 

At  the  period  I  have  referred  to  the  former  followed  the 
latter.  I  have  dwelt  at  some  length  upon  this  brief  period  in 
the  public  life  of  Mr.  Fesseuden,  because  I  have  always  felt 
that  the  services  he  so  quietly  and  unostentatiously  rendered  the 
country  at  this  critical  juncture  had  never  been  duly  appre 
ciated,  and  also  because  it  illustrates  particularly  his  most 
valuable  traits  of  character  :  his  comprehensive  statesmanship, 
his  unselfish  patriotism,  the  readiness  and  availability  of  his 
powers  in  a  case  of  emergency,  and  his  firm,  abiding  faith  in 
the  patriotism  of  the  American  people.  Holding  positions  in 


G4 


REMARKS    OF   MR.    LYNCH   ON 


the  Government  which  afforded  him  great  opportunities  to 
enrich  himself,  he  was  never  suspected  of  prostituting  them 
to  that  purpose.  With  abilities  that  would  have  brought  him 
large  wealth  in  his  profession,  he  gave  his  time  to  the  service 
of  his  country,  and  left  that  service  as  poor  as  he  entered  it. 

I  regret  to  feel  that  such  virtue  in  a  public  man  calls  for 
special  commendation.  The  worst  enemy  of  Mr.  Fessenden 
never  dared  question  his  scrupulous  integrity.  He  was  indeed 
God's  noblest  work,  an  honest  man.  He  appeared  to  regard 
with  supreme  indifference  criticisms  on  his  public  acts,  seldom 
betraying  any  emotions  or  taking  any  pains  to  correct  public 
opinion  when  he  was  assailed  or  his  motives  misjudged;  yet 
he  was  not  unmindful  of  the  approbation  of  his  fellow-men, 
but  was  governed  by  the  conviction  that  it  could  best  be  per 
manently  secured  by  deserving  it. 

To  say  that  Mr.  Fessenden  had  no  faults  would  be  to  claim 
for  him  exemption  from  the  frailties  of  humanity;  but  his  faults 
were  not  of  the  meaner,  but  of  the  nobler  kind, 

"  And  ev'n  his  failings  leaned  to  virtue's  side." 

In  manner  he  was  cold,  reserved,  and  somewhat  aristocratic, 
communing  little  with  his  fellow-men.  His  private  life  was 
retired  and  unostentatious.  He  had  but  few  intimate  friends, 
and  shrank  almost  instinctively  from  that  general  acquaintance 
and  notoriety  in  which  persons  differently  constituted  find 
delight;  but  for  those  who  did  enjoy  his  confidence  and  esteem, 
his  friendship,  though  not  demonstrative,  was  strong  and  en 
during  ;  and  by  such  he  was  admired  and  beloved,  and  it  was 
difficult  for  them  to  understand  how  he  could  be  regarded  as 
cold  and  selfish.  They  saw  in  the  cold  exterior  and  somewhat 
proud  reserve  a  manly  independence  and  a  contempt  of  mean 
ingless  or  hypocritical  professions,  and  beneath  it  a  generous 
nature  and  a  warm  heart. 

Such,  sir,  is  the  man  whose  life  and  services  we  this  day  com 
memorate  and  whose  loss  we  mourn.  The  nation  has  few  such 


WILLIAM    PITT    FESSENDEN. 


to  spare  from  its  councils.  May  we  emulate  Ms  virtues,  and 
so  live  and  serve  our  country  that  when  we  depart  we  may 
deserve  from  it  the  plaudit  which  is  to-day  so  heartily  bestowed 
on  our  departed  friend,  "  Well  done,  good  and  faithful  servant." 
Mr.  Speaker,  I  now  offer  the  following  resolutions : 

Resolved,  That  this  House  has  heard  with  deep  sensibility  the  announce 
ment  of  the  death  of  Hon.  William  Pitt  Fessenden,  a  Senator  in  Congress 
from  the  State  of  Maine. 

Resolved,  That  as  a  testimony  of  respect  for  the  memory  of  the  deceased 
the  members  and  officers  of  this  House  will  wear  the  usual  badge  of  mourn 
ing  for  thirty  days. 

Resolved,  That  the  proceedings  of  this  House  in  relation  to  the  death  of 
Hon.  William  Pitt  Fessenden  be  communicated  to  his  family  by  the  Clerk. 

Resolved,  That  as  a  further  mark  of  respect  for  the  memory  of  the  de 
ceased  this  House  do  now  adjourn. 


REMARKS  BY  MR.  PETERS,  OF  MAINE. 

Mr.  Speaker :  I  rise  to  second  the  resolutions.  I  cannot  let 
the  occasion  pass  without  adding  a  few  words  to  the  record  in 
memory  of  a  man  for  whom  I  entertained  so  much  respect  and 
admiration  as  I  did  for  the  late  Senator  from  Maine.  But  little 
can  be  added  to  what  has  been  said,  in  the  public  press  and 
public  addresses,  of  the  history  and  character  of  the  statesman 
whose  death  the  people  of  his  own  State  and  the  country  at 
large  at  this  time  so  sorrowfully  mourn. 

William  Pitt  Fessenden  had  a  reputation  for  ability  varying 
but  little  with  classes  of  men,  or  in  periods  of  time,  and  it  has 
been  by  someone  truly  remarked  that  the  characteristics  ex 
hibited  in  his  congressional  life  were  conspicuously  displayed 
by  him  at  the  early  age  of  seventeen.  In  his  earliest  profes 
sional  and  political  career  he  took  a  place  in  the  front  rank  of 
eminent  public  men  and  easily  held  it  to  the  end. 

In  his  earlier  life,  and  for  a  long  period  of  time,  the  practice 
of  the  law  was  his  delightful  avocation.  He  had  a  natural 


G6  REMARKS   OF   MR.    PETERS    ON 

legal  mind.  He  would  have  excelled  in  all  respects  as  a 
judge,  and  I  have  reason  to  believe  that  for  many  years 
he  entertained  an  opinion  that  it  would  have  satisfied  his 
tastes  and  inclination  to  have  occupied  a  place  on  the 
bench. 

Until  the  formation  of  the  present  Republican  party  of 
the  country  having  his  associations  with  the  Whig  party  as 
a  compeer  of  George  Evans,  of  Maine,  and  an  admirer  and 
close  friend  of  Daniel  Webster,  of  Massachusetts,  although 
highly  esteemed  by  his  Democratic  opponents,  he  found  them 
almost  always  too  strong  an  opposing  organization  to  allow 
him  to  obtain  any  considerable  political  place.  Portland, 
however,  sent  him  as  her  local  representative  to  the  State 
Legislature,  and  in  the  great  upheaving  of  politics  in  1840 
he  was  elected  for  a  term  as  a  Representative  in  the  Congress 
of  the  United  States.  Unfortunately  for  the  old  and  respect 
able  Whig  party,  its  muniments  consisted  more  in  idols  than 
in  success ;  and  while  Mr.  Fessendeu  was  for  many  times 
and  many  years  its  candidate  for  United  States  Senator,  it 
was  not  until  the  Democratic  party  in  Maine  had  become 
overthrown  upon  the  issues  growing  out  of  slavery  that  he 
reached  that  eminent  elevation.  In  this  legislative  foruin 
he  secured  for  himself  a  proud  and  enviable  fame.  To  say 
nothing  of  the  powers  of  his  mind  as  impressed  upon  other 
legislation,  his  report  as  chairman  of  the  Joint  Special  Com 
mittee  on  Reconstruction  will  be  an  enduring  monument  to 
his  memory.  Its  clear  statements,  fairness  of  proposition, 
and  sound  reasoning  swayed  the  public  mind  at  a  critical  mo 
ment  in  the  affairs  of  our  country  when  we  could  not  see  our 
way  clearly  through  the  perplexing  questions  which  beset  us. 
I  recollect  well  its  powerful  effect  upon  the  minds  of  those 
in  my  section  of  the  country  who  were  inclined  to  look  upon 
our  prospects  and  situation  with  dissatisfaction.  It  was  unan 
swerable.  His  eloquent  friend,  Hon.  James  S.  Pike,  thus 
well  characterizes  it: 


WILLIAM   PITT   FESSENDEN. 


"  Mr.  Fessenden's  report  on  reconstruction  stands  as  the  ablest  political 
document  drawn  during  the  war,  and  if  it  does  not  exhibit  initiative,  it 
displays  what  is  better,  namely,  a  clear  comprehension  of  a  wholly  novel 
political  situation,  a  masterly  interpretation  of  its  phenomena,  and  a  lucid 
exposition  of  the  true  method  of  treatment  of  a  vast  and  perplexing  national 
disorder." 

Although  Mr.  Fessenden  in  some  quarters  has  been  called 
cool  and  conservative  in  meeting  the  issues  of  peace  succeeding 
war,  I  have  abundant  reason  to  believe  that  at  that  time  he 
would  have  gone  beyond  the  recommendations  of  his  report, 
and  in  the  direction  we  have  since  taken,  but  for  the  counsels 
of  men  esteemed  more  radical  than  he  that  the  moment  for  it 
had  not  arrived. 

As  an  advocate  or  debater  Mr,  Fessenden's  qualities  could 
hardly  be  surpassed.  He  had  clearness,  directness,  and 
earnestness,  impelled  by  great  mental  force.  His  mind 
worked  with  the  smoothness  of  machinery,  without  friction 
or  chafe  ;  his  perceptions  were  clear  and  exact,  and  so  clearly 
did  he  see  the  truth  or  falsehood  of  almost  every  proposition, 
that  he  may  have  been  impatient  at  times  with  the  workings  of 
other  minds  which  moved  with  less  rapidity  and  thoroughness 
than  his  own.  It  was  said  of  an  eminent  British  orator  that 
his  intellect  was  all  feeling  and  his  feeling  all  intellect.  I 
have  often  thought  of  Mr.  Fessenden  that  his  feeling  was  but 
intellect,  for  when  his  mind  was  enkindled  to  a  blaze  in  the 
cause  he  advocated,  all  the  qualities  of  his  head  and  heart 
seemed  to  conspire  to  furnish  the  intellectual  and  magnetic 
force  commanded  by  him.  His  style  was  simple  and  unstudied, 
but  marked  by  fine  taste.  He  disliked  all  attempt  at  display, 
and  had  no  ear  and  but  little  toleration  for  a  person  whom  the 
great  dramatic  poet  describes  as  "  drawing  out  the  thread  of 
his  verbosity  finer  than  the  staple  of  his  argument;"  quick, 
though  cool  and  cautious,  and  in  purpose  independent  and 
bold.  No  man  gained  an  advantage  of  him  by  personal 
assault  ;  he  would  strike  upon  the  weak  point  of  his  adversary 
with  unerring  aim  and  resistless  force. 


(J3  REMARKS   OF   MR.    PETERS    ON 

One  of  the  crowning  traits  of  his  character  was  sterling 
integrity.  His  actions  and  motives  were  clear,  transparent; 
his  conduct  was  not  based  upon  a  formulary  of  morals  such  as 
in  practice  would  satisfy  the  requisitions  of  society  and  obtain 
the  approval  of  the  world,  but  an  absolute  and  profound  love 
of  truth  was  born  in  him,  to  which,  through  a  long  life,  in  all 
public  and  private  relations,  he  most  rigidly  adhered  without 
feeling  even  a  temptation  for  departure  from  it.  His  intellect, 
as  well  as  heart,  was  honest.  He  had  the  unbounded  respect 
of  all  the  courts  within  the  jurisdiction  of  which  he  was  known. 
An  ex-chief  justice  of  Maine  once  told  me  that  Mr.  Fessendeu 
submitted  a  case  at  law  to  the  court  and  argued  it  with  great 
force ;  afterward,  upon  reflection,  he  became  doubtful  of  the 
value  of  the  proposition  he  had  maintained,  and  was  unwilling 
that  he  should  be  considered  as  abiding  by  it,  and  so  called  up 
the  case  to  qualify  the  views  he  had  submitted ;  notwithstand 
ing  which,  and  all  his  frankness,  the  court  decided  the  case 
upon  the  objectionable  point  in  his  favor. 

Mr.  Speaker,  I  shall  never  forget  his  internal  struggles  upon 
the  question  of  impeachment.  I  saw  the  deep  emotion  he  felt 
while  his  friends  were  urging,  if  not  demanding,  his  vote  for 
the  conviction  of  Andrew  Johnson.  I  knew  his  deep  consci 
entiousness  on  the  subject,  and  you  and  I  very  well  knew  that 
wherever  the  tendencies  of  his  mind  and  his  deliberate  con 
victions  carried  him,  there,  without  regard  to  consequences, 
would  he  stand  forever.  It  was  to  him  the  trying  scene  of  a 
lifetime.  No  man  in  Maine,  to  my  knowledge  or  belief,  ever 
deliberately  offered  to  cast  any  imputation  of  dishonesty  upon 
his  proud  name  and  record  for  that  vote.  That  it  to  some 
extent  created  an  alienation  of  feeling  and  sentiment  toward 
him  cannot  be  denied.  What  would  have  been  the  result  of 
such  alienation  upon  the  question  of  his  re-election  as  a 
Senator  a  year  hence  was  with  him  a  point  of  the  deepest 
interest.  His  soul  seemed  agitated  to  know  whether  for  the 
performance  of  an  act,  however  distasteful  to  his  friends,  but 


WILLIAM    PITT    FESSENDEN.  (JQ 

dictated  by  his  conscience,  lie  should  stand  or  fall  in   the 
estimation  of  his  noble  and  beloved  constituents. 
He  was  in  a  position,  as  the  poet  hath  it,  to — 

"  Know  how  sublime  a  thing  it  is 
To  suffer  and  be  strong." 

His  nature  made  him  a  match  for  any  adversity.  And  here 
let  me  say,  I  have  several  times  since  his  death  noticed  in  the 
newspapers  a  statement  that  in  the  earlier  stages  of  the  con 
troversy  Mr.  Fessenden  favored  the  idea  of  prosecuting  an 
impeachment.  Such  an  assertion  is  not  just  to  his  memory, 
for  I  know  that  at  all  times  and  under  all  circumstances  he 
was  strongly  opposed  to  it  upon  all  the  grounds  of  a  wise 
expediency.  He  has  always  contended  that  his  action  as  a 
Senator  upon  that  memorable  occasion  would  redound  to  the 
future  honor  and  prosperity  of  the  Republican  party. 

What  would  have  been  the  personal  future  of  our  great  and 
beloved  Senator  had  he  lived,  it  is  useless  now  to  attempt  to 
predict.  In  the  very  prime  of  his  usefulness  to  his  State  and 
nation  he  has  been  taken  from  us.  Maine  has  lost  a  son  who 
was  always  to  her  an  idol,  and  the  country  has  been  deprived 
of  one  of  her  most  illustrious  and  gifted  men.  That  intelli 
gent  and  beaming  face,  the  gentle  and  modest  form,  always  so 
erect  and  undaunted  in  any  forum,  the  winning  conversation, 
the  charm  of  simple  manners,  the  magnetic  personal  presence, 
and  the  friendly  encouragements  which  so  won  for  him  the 
affection  of  his  friends  and  associates,  will  be  familiar  to  us  no 
more.  It  becomes  hard  for  me  to  say  of  such  a  man,  Farewell! 


REMARKS  BY  MR.  BROOKS,  OF  NEW  YORK. 

The  more  we  advance  along  the  pathway  of  life  the  more 
deeply  do  we  feel  occasions  of  this  sort  when  we  are  obliged  to 
take  part  in  them,  for  death  comes  nearer  to  us,  and  the  shafts 
which  hit  others  will  soon  hit  us. 


70  REMARKS    OP   MR.    BROOKS   ON 

I  first  came  here  into  the  House  of  Representatives  some 
twenty  years  ago.  On  looking  about  me  now,  I  find  that  there 
are  but  four  of  us  left  in  public  life,  three  of  whom  are  now  on 
the  floor  of  this  House.  One  is  the  honorable  gentleman  from 
Ohio,  [Mr.  Schenck,]  the  chairman  of  the  Committee  of  Ways 
and  Means;  another  is  the  chairman  of  the  Committee  on 
Commerce,  [Mr.  Dixon,]  and  another  the  chairman  of  the  Com 
mittee  on  the  Public  Lands,  [Mr.  Julian.]  Death  has  struck 
down  all,  or  nearly  all  who  were  then  in  the  House  of  Eepre 
sentatives  ;  and  they  who  have  not  been  stricken  down,  have 
been  more  or  less  removed  from  public  life,  and  are  now  hardly 
known  to  this  day  or  generation. 

Hence  do  I  now  feel  the  more  deeply  the  death  of  one  who 
was  not  only  a  contemporary  and  companion  in  public  life,  but 
also  a  companion  in  my  own  early  life.  Mr.  Fessenden  was  my 
friend,  associate,  room-mate,  and  bed-fellow  in  my  early  boy 
hood.  I  grew  up  with  him  in  the  town  of  Lewiston,  then  a 
comparatively  small  and  unknown  village  in  Maine,  on  the 
Androscoggin  River,  on  the  frontier  of  civilization,  but  now  a 
large  and  populous  manufacturing  town.  He  was  the  teacher 
of  the  village  school  there,  while  I  was  a  boy  in  a  country 
store,  acting  as  clerk  in  the  establishment.  He,  I  think,  was 
sixteen  or  seventeen  years  of  age,  a  student  then  in  Bowdoiii 
college,  Maine,  and  sent  forth  to  teach  in  the  then  small  village 
of  Lewiston,  where  there  were  but  very  few  inhabitants,  and 
those  struggling  with  the  forest  and  the  field,  and  but  little 
given  to  literature. 

He  was  some  few  years  older  than  I,  but  we  were  almost  the 
only  persons  in  that  village  at  that  time  who  had  a  love  for 
books  and  who  were  devoted  to  literary  pursuits.  Hence  our 
companionship  was  constant. 

No  place  is  more  fitted  for  the  education  of  a  young  man  for 
public  life,  or  for  private  life,  than  the  position  of  teacher  of  a 
country  school.  Accustomed  there  to  govern  others,  a  man 
soon  learns  to  govern  himself,  and  thus  prepare  himself  for  that 


WILLIAM   PITT    FESSENDEtf. 


public  life  in  which  more  important  even  than  the  government 
of  others,  is  the  government  of  himself. 

We  studied  many  books  together,  some  of  them  not  now 
very  well  known,  such  as  Bigland's  History  of  the  World, 
Rollin's  Ancient  History,  then  Russell's  Modern  Europe,  or  Plu 
tarch's  Lives;  and  we  read  through  and  through  the  village 
library,  which  was  deemed  magnificent,  with  its  forty  or  fifty 
volumes. 

We  afterward  came  into  competition  for  public  life,  though 
belonging  to  the  same  political  party.  He  became  a  lawyer  in 
Portland,  Maine,  and  I  returned  there  to  act  as  editor  of  the 
Portland  Advertiser.  As  young  men  we  were  rivals  for  the 
public  favor,  and  more  or  less  constantly  came  into  competi 
tion  for  that  public  favor.  I  represented  the  town  of  Portland 
in  the  Legislature  of  Maine  some  years  before  he  did,  although 
younger  than  he  was,  and  I  was  a  candidate  for  Congress  in 
that  district  which  he  afterwards  represented  in  the  House  of 
Representatives,  though  it  was  largely  democratic,  by  some 
fifteen  hundred  or  two  thousand  majority. 

In  the  rivalry  for  public  life,  in  that  contest  of  youthful 
ambition,  we  maintained  our  social  relations  with  each  other  ; 
and  in  the  end  our  ambition  was  amply  gratified  ;  if  not  there, 
elsewhere,  in  all  the  honors  to  which  we  aspired  in  our  early 
youth. 

I  have  mentioned  these  facts  in  connection  with  myself, 
though  they  may  seem  somewhat  personal,  in  order  to  excuse 
the  deep  feeling  which  I  am  showing  while  now  paying  a 
tribute  to  the  friend  and  companion  of  my  youthful  days  and 
my  associate  afterward  in  public  life. 

We  met  again  in  this  Capitol  ;  he,  in  the  other  branch  of  the 
Government,  and  I,  in  this  ;  and  though  we  had  been  associated 
in  political  feeling  and  political  principles  for  many  years  from 
our  boyhood  up,  we  were  when  we  thus  met  in  public  life 
called  upon  to  part  company  politically.  The  father  of  Mr. 
Fessenden  was  an  earnest  Federalist.  He  was  a  distinguished 


72  REMARKS    OF   MR.    BROOKS    ON  ( 

lawyer  of  the  State  of  Maine,  well  known  throughout  !N~ew 
England,  and  occupying  the  highest  position  at  the  bar.  His 
father,  with  his  powerful  intellect,  gradually  educated  his 
rising  son  in  the  principles  of  the  Federal  party,  in  which  he 
himself  had  been  trained  and  in  which  he  had  felt  such  a 
lively  interest.  When  great  questions  arose  here  relating  to 
the  construction  of  the  Constitution  and  the  administration  of 
the  Government,  Mr.  Fessenden  naturally  acted  upon  the  prin 
ciples  in  which  he  had  been  educated,  while  I  followed  those 
which  I  had  imbibed.  I  cherished  profound  regard  for  the 
clear  rights  of  the  States,  while  he  gave  a  higher  respect 
to  the  consolidated  powers  of  the  Federal  Government. 

When  Mr.  Fessenden  first  entered  the  House  of  Bepresenta- 
tives  as  a  member,  as  well  as  when  he  took  a  seat  in  the 
Senate  of  the  United  States,  there  were  great  and  mighty  men 
upon  the  floor  of  both  Houses  of  Congress.  There  were  in  the 
House  such  men  as  MeDuffie,  Sergeant,  Binney,  John  Quincy 
Adams,  Wise,  Gushing,  Peyton,  Stanley,  Evans,  and  Fillmore. 
In  the  Senate  there  were,  or  recently  had  been,  such  men  as 
Clay,  Webster,  Calhoun,  Clayton,  Cass,  Frelinghuysen,  Wright, 
Eives,  and  Leigh.  Whoever  met  and  struggled  with  those  men 
in  debate,  or  in  any  contest  whatever,  must  have  been  equal  to 
the  occasion  or  he  could  not  have  attained  the  exalted  position 
which  Mr.  Fessenden  won  in  both  Houses  of  Congress. 

When  this  House  impeached  the  late  President  of  the  United 
States,  I  never  had  a  doubt  in  my  own  mind  what  course  Mr. 
Fessendeu  would  pursue.  Many  of  my  colleagues  here  will 
remember  that  on  repeated  occasions  I  said  to  them,  "There 
can  be  no  earthly  doubt  as  to  the  vote  of  Mr.  Fessenden."  I 
knew  his  devotion  to  principle  as  a  lawyer ;  I  knew  that  he 
would  look  at  the  question,  not  as  a  politician,  not  as  a  states 
man,  not  as  a  public  man,  but  as  a  lawyer  and  a  jurist,  and  I 
never  doubted  what  his  decision  as  a  judge  would  be.  And, 
sir,  his  vote  upon  that  question  is  an  act  of  which  his  party 
ought  to  forgive  him  ;  for,  in  my  judgment,  the  failure  of  im- 


WILLIAM    PITT    FESSENDEN.  73 

peachment  saved  his  party  from  defeat  and  destruction.  As  a 
mere  party  man  I  always  desired  the  success  of  the  impeach 
ment  project,  though  as  a  public  man  I  shrank  with  horror 
from  the  fatal  precedent.  If  impeachment  had  been  success 
ful,  and  the  then  incoming  President  had  been  called  on  to  dis 
tribute  the  patronage  and  power  of  this  Government,  who 
could  have  foreseen  the  amount  of  disappointment  and  bad 
feeling  among  the  members  of  the  party  now  in  power  that 
would  have  been  the  result  of  that  distribution  of  patronage 
prior  to  a  presidential  election?  And  if  impeachment  had 
been  successful  the  action  of  the  Democratic  party  in  its 
nominations  would  have  been  different.  With  all  our  devo 
tion  to  intellect,  with  all  the  love  of  the  Democratic  party 
for  its  first  and  foremost  men,  it  would  have  been  neces 
sary  and  wise  for  us  under  such  circumstances  to  select 
some  John  Doe  or  Eichard  Roe  who  might  have  won  a 
success  which  the  distinguished  presidential  nominee  of  our 
party  failed  to  secure.  Hence,  I  say  that,  in  my  judgment, 
Mr.  Fessenden  rendered  high  service  to  his  party  by  voting 
•'no"  as  a  judge,  and  by  thus  relieving  them  from  the  embar 
rassing  position  in  which  they  had  been  placed  by  the  House. 
Mr.  Fessenden's  beau  ideal  of  a  Senator  was  well  illustrated 
by  the  honorable  gentleman  from  the  Portland  district,  Maine, 
in  the  extract  he  read  from  a  speech  he  made.  His  unflinch 
ing  devotion  to  duty,  his  love  of  independence,  his  fearless 
ness,  his  determination  to  do  his  duty — no  matter  what  be 
came  of  himself  personally — without  regard  to  anything  that 
might  affect  him,  we  have  all  seen  in  his  action  on  this  im 
peachment  case.  AVe  have  also  seen  that  the  independence 
which  he  manifested  there  amid  trial  and  temptation,  he  mani 
fested  throughout  his  entire  life. 

My  honorable  friend  from  Portland,  Maine,  in  the  course  of 
his  beautiful  eulogy,  took  occasion  to  say  that  Mr.  Fessenden 
was  not  eloquent.  In  that  I  differ  from  him  entirely.  Elo 
quence,  sir,  is  not  mere  words.  Eloquence  is  not  the  pompous 


10 


74  REMAKES   OF   MR.    DAWES    ON 

parade  of  speech.  Eloquence  is  not  emphasis,  ejaculation,  ges 
ticulation,  or  intonation.  The  orator  is  not  he  who  can  roll  off 
periods  on  sesquipedalian  words,  or  emblazon  feeble  thought 
in  brilliant  rhetoric ;  but  it  is  he  whose  mind  most  powerfully 
grasps  ideas,  and  with  unerring  logic,  pours  them  forth  in  fitting 
words  to  the  public  ear.  He  who  can  do  that  is  really  an  elo 
quent  man;  and  in  that  respect,  sir,  no  man  was  more  eloquent 
than  Mr.  Fessenden. 

Mr.  Speaker,  the  great  characteristic  of  Mr.  Fessenden  was 
his  individuality,  his  fearless  individuality.  He  went  with  his 
party  when  he  thought  it  was  right,  and  nothing  on  earth 
could  induce  him  to  go  with  his  party  when  he  thought  it  was 
wrong.  No  screws  of  party,  no  pressure  of  caucus,  no  outcry 
of  the  public  press,  no  thundering  denunciations  of  the  mob, 
ever  affected  his  conscience  or  moved  him  in  the  least  from 
what  he  believed  his  duty  to  his  country ;  and  I  commend  that 
independence,  that  individuality,  to  all  the  public  men  of  this 
day,  for  it  is  in  that  alone  they  may  hope  to  secure  abiding  fame 
as  public  men.  We,  who  are  here  to-day  in  mere  party  strug 
gles,  will  pass  away  and  soon  be  forgotten  if  that  is  all  we  leave 
behind.  Let  us  therefore  endeavor  to  leave  such  honest 
records  behind  us  as  those  of  Mr.  Fesseuden,  who  has  be 
queathed  a  name  to  posterity,  as  well  as  to  his  children,  which 
shines  as  bright  as  the  stars  in  heaven. 


REMAKES  OF  MR.  DAWES,  OF  MASSACHUSETTS. 

Mr.  Speaker :  The  biography  of  Mr.  Fessenden  has  been 
spoken  in  fitting  terms,  and  nothing  can  be  added  to  the  elo 
quent  words  of  tribute  to  his  talents  and  worth  which  have  al 
ready  fallen  from  other  lips.  And  yet  I  would  like  very  briefly 
to  give  utterance  to  the  feelings  of  personal  as  well  as  public 
loss  with  which  his  death  has  burdened  me.  I  cannot  forget 
on  this  occasion  that  he  gave  me  his  hand  at  the  door  upon  my 


WILLIAM    PITT    FESSENDEN.  75 

entrance  into  public  life,  and  that  his  welcome  ripened  into  a 
personal  friendship,  which,  however  widely  we  sometimes  dif 
fered,  nevertheless  suffered  no  abatement  while  he  lived.  And 
upon  his  bier  to-day  I  lay  the  offering  of  a  stricken  friend. 

Mr.  Fessenden  came  to  the  public  service  first  in  this  House 
for  a  single  term  5  many  years  before  I  met  him  here,  then  a 
young  man  of  growing  fame  and  toward  whose  future  the  ex 
pectations  of  his  friends  turned  with  pride  and  confidence.  It 
was  as  early  as  1841,  while  the  great  statesmen  of  the  past  gen 
eration  were  still  holding  imperious  sway  in  these  halls  and 
were  at  the  zenith  of  their  fame  and  influence.  He  came  among 
them,  however,  with  a  mind  so  well  disciplined  by  early  study 
and  professional  training  as  well  as  public  service  in  his  own 
State  as  to  be  able  at  once  to  take  the  foremost  rank  as  a  de 
bater  even  upon  that  arena,  and  to  make  room  for  himself 
where  the  strongest  stood.  He  left  the  House  of  Representa 
tives  at  the  end  of  a  single  term  to  return  to  the  chosen  pro 
fession  of  his  life,  with  a  reputation  established  for  clearness  of 
perception,  accuracy  of  statement,  and  power  of  argument 
hardly  equalled  even  then  by  any  of  his  compeers.  The  next 
ten  years  of  his  life,  devoted  to  his  profession  with  signal  suc 
cess  at  the  bar  of  his  native  State,  taking  rank  and  leadership 
among  those  who  had  rendered  that  bar  illustrious,  was  never 
theless  a  constant,  though,  perhaps,  unconscious  preparation 
for  that  greater  work  to  which  he  seemed  called  on  his  return 
to  the  Senate  in  1853,  and  in  which,  with  the  exception  of  the 
few  months  he  was  Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  was  spent  the 
remainder  of  his  strength  and  life. 

His  senatorial  career  covered  the  most  eventful  period  in  the 
history  of  the  nation.  About  him  and  before  his  eyes  began 
and  were  matured  those  plots  for  the  dismemberment  of  the 
Republic  which  eventually  drenched  the  land  in  blood.  Trea 
son  reared  its  head  in  the  Senate  Chamber,  and  stalked  out  of 
the  open  door  with  the  torch  of  war  in  its  hand.  Firm  hands 
and  stout  hearts  and  clear  heads  alone  could  stay  up  against 


76  REMARKS   0!"   MR.   DA  WES   ON 

the  assaults  of  traitors  the  tottering  government.  And  among 
all  upon  whose  part  in  that  great  life  struggle  we  look  back 
from  the  calm  and  peace  of  this  day,  no  hands  were  firmer,  no 
heart  was  stouter,  and  no  head  was  clearer  than  his. 

There  was  no  mind  in  its  organism  or  its  culture  like  his,  so 
completely  made  for  antagonism  and  argument,  and  trained, 
like  the  athlete  for  his  work,  to  constant  conflict  and  wrestling. 
For  this  reason  he  seemed  to  so  stand  alone  among  his  peers 
that  the  sphere  in  which  he  worked  was  left  to  him,  few  ven 
turing  to  dispute  his  supremacy  in  it.  To  this  peculiarity  of 
mental  structure  and  discipline  is  attributable  much  of  that 
occasion  for  criticism  to  which  his  course  not  imfrequently  gave 
rise.  In  debate  he  so  hated  sophistry  that  nothing  could  re 
strain  him  from  rending  it  in  pieces,  no  matter  whom  he 
wounded.  Subterfuge  and  pretense  in  argument  were  dealt 
with  by  him  as  downright  dishonesty  and  fraud.  And  some 
times,  thinking  he  saw  these  phantoms  flitting  across  the  field 
of  debate,  he  would  charge  indiscriminately  upon  friend  and 
foe,  leaving  grievous  wounds  that  were  long  in  healing;  and 
yet  self-possession,  clearness  of  mental  vision,  directness  and 
aptitude  of  expression,  in  short,  perfect  command  of  thought 
and  language  in  the  most  animated  debate,  were  marked  char 
acteristics  of  his  mind.  In  current  debate  he  had  but  few  if 
any  equals.  He  wielded  a  Damascus  blade  that  never  was 
broken  and  seldom  parried.  With  the  coolness  and  delibera 
tion  of  a  surgeon  with  his  dissecting  knife,  he  laid  bare  every 
argument  that  fell  in  his  way,  and  never  left  his  subject  so  long 
as  a  muscle  remained  uncloven  or  a  limb  unjointed. 

He  had  power,  also,  to  touch  the  tenderest  chord  and  stir 
the  deepest  fountain  by  his  eloquence  if  fitting  occasion  re 
quired  it.  Once  in  debate,  all  unpremeditated,  he  was  forced 
to  speak  of  his  own  personal  sacrifices  in  the  war,  and  his 
allusion  to  one  son  who  had  fallen  and  to  another  who  had 
lost  a  limb  in  battle  moistened  every  eye  in  the  Senate  Cham 
ber.  And  when  the  late  Executive,  by  an  insane  attempt  at 


WILLIAM    PITT    FES  SEN  DEN. 


forcible  ejectment  from  office,  crowned  his  long  and  bitter  hos 
tility  to  that  great  Minister  of  War  who  had  organized  victory 
out  of  defeat,  and  wrested  national  salvation  from  the  very 
jaws  of  national  dissolution,  the  defense  of  Mr.  Stanton  pro 
nounced  by  Mr.  Fessenden,  without  preparation,  at  midnight 
upon  the  floor  of  the  Senate,  will  live  forever. 

Not  less  conspicuous  than  the  great  ability  with  which  he 
grappled  those  mighty  questions  born  of  the  war,  which 
divided  and  shook  the  nation,  were  the  painstaking  and  fidel 
ity  which  he  brought  to  the  discharge  of  every  official  duty, 
however  minute  or  apparently  unimportant.  In  the  dull  and 
painful  drudgery  as  w^ell  as  in  the  attractive  and  exciting  or 
the  grave  and  responsible  duties  of  the  statesman,  he  was 
equally  patient  and  faithful,  performing  what  each  day  fell  to 
his  lot  as  if  it  were  his  specialty. 

To  all  his  work  he  brought  an  official  and  personal  integ 
rity  that  never  for  a  moment  encountered  a  suspicion  or  a 
whisper.  He  trod  the  devious  and  doubtful  ways  of  oppor 
tunity  and  temptation  with  unsoiled  feet,  and  moved  amid 
corruption  and  scandal  with  raiment  untarnished.  When 
recently  his  convictions  of  public  duty  caused  him  to  sepa 
rate  so  widely  from  political  associates  and  personal  friends 
that  permanent  alienation  seemed  inevitable,  the  universal 
tribute  to  personal  integrity  which  was  heard  above  the 
tempest  stilled  at  last  the  waves  of  public  indignation,  and 
plucked  reconciliation  from  the  unrelenting  lips  of  denuncia 
tion  itself. 

At  his  decease  Mr.  Fessenden  was  chairman  of  the  Com 
mittee  on  Appropriations  in  the  Senate,  and  it  was  in  the  dis 
charge  of  his  official  duties  as  such  that  I  last  met  him.  My 
intercourse  with  him  in  that  capacity  has  profoundly  impressed 
me  with  the  loss  the  nation  has  sustained  in  his  death.  His 
great  familiarity  with  every  detail  of  his  multiplied  work,  his 
scrupulous  care,  and,  over  and  pervading  all,  his  fearless  in 
tegrity,  were  qualities  it  is  not  easy  to  supply. 


78  REMARKS    OF    MR.    HALE    ON 

I  have  not  spoken  of  any  great  public  measure  with  which 
the  name  of  Mr.  Fessenden  is  identified.  In  the  grand  rebuild 
ing  of  the  national  structure  upon  the  ashes  of  the  rebellion 
he  worked  faithfully  and  wisely.  But  if  he  originated  less,  he 
fashioned  more.  Measures  which  others  introduced  lost  none 
of  their  inherent  value  under  his  molding  and  polishing  hand; 
and  no  blot  or  blemish,  no  flaw  or  failure,  can  be  traced  to  his 
folly. 

Of  the  great  statesmen  who  have  finished  their  work  and 
departed,  Mr.  Fessenden  will  stand  alone  in  history.  The 
proud  niche  his  name  and  fame  will  fill  was  made  by  and  for 
himself,  and  no  one  can  reach  or  occupy  it  with  him.  Such 
was  the  structure  of  his  mind  "and  such  his  habits  of  thought 
and  work  that  he  could  not  always  co-operate  with  others. 
That  liberty  of  independent  thought  and  action  which  he 
always  asserted  permits  us  in  this  hour  to  put  on  record  our 
differences  with  him  and  our  sorrow  for  their  consequences. 
But  as  "it  is  the  angles  of  the  diamond  which  give  it  its 
beauty  and  its  brilliancy,"  so  these  differences  will  not  impair 
a  just  estimate  of  the  life  and  character  of  a  great  statesman 
except  it  be  in  the  mind  of  him,  the  dead  unbroken  level  of 
whose  pathway  has  never  led  him  to  experience  the  '•  agony 
of  a  doubt  or  the  luxurv  of  a  conviction." 


REMARKS  BY  MR.  HALE,  OF  MAINE. 

Mr.  Speaker:  I  speak  as  a  young  man  who  admired  and  re 
vered  William  Pitt  Fessenden.  Twelve  years  ago,  when  I  cast 
my  first  vote,  he  was  an  honored  Senator  from  the  State  of 
Maine.  In  that  State  his  life  had  been  passed,  and  his  educa 
tion  and  experience  had  been  such  as  to  eminently  fit  him  for 
the  high  place  which  he  then  filled. 

He  was  a  graduate  of  our  oldest  college,  had  chosen  the 
profession  of  law,  been  admitted  to  practice  at  an  early  age, 


WILLIAM    PITT    FESS  EN  DEN.  79 

and  for  many  years  bad  given  to  it  his  best  talent,  wbicb  bad 
carried  him  to  the  head  of  the  profession  in  bis  State. 

His  professional  life  was  always  marked  by  the  highest 
sense  of  honor,  by  a  keen  sympathy  for  the  poor  or  oppressed 
suitor,  and  by  a  plainly-shown  impatience  at  that  public 
clamor  which  now  and  then  usurps  the  place  of  public  justice, 
and  demands  a  victim  without  much  heed  as  to  the  question 
of  guilt  or  innocence.  His  single  term  in  this  House,  and  his 
longer  service  in  our  State  Legislature,  had  prevented  his  mind 
from  running  in  a  purely  legal  channel,  and  he  stood,  by 
natural  ability  and  varied  training,  the  peer  of  his  fellows  in 
the  United  States  Senate. 

Since  that  time  his  public  life  has  been  open  to  the  view  of 
all,  and  in  common  with,  I  suppose,  a  large  majority  of  men 
who  have  watched  it,  I  have  learned  the  lesson  of  respect  for 
its  excellence.  Within  the  last  few  years  I  have  enjoyed  the 
privilege  of  his  close  acquaintance  and  friendship,  and  can 
bear  earnest  testimony  to  the  kindness  of  heart  and  gracious- 
ness  of  manner  which  made  him,  to  those  who  knew  him  best, 
the  good  friend  and  fascinating  companion.  I  hope  to  carry 
through  my  life  a  green  memory  of  the  good  counsel  and  help 
that  he  always  generously  gave  me.  Of  his  career  as  a  public 
man  it  is  not  fitting  that  I  should  attempt  to  speak.  It  was 
open  to  inspection  from  its  beginning  to  its  close,  and,  like  the 
broad  river  which  gains  new  volume  with  every  affluent,  it 
increased  in  its  force  with  each  year  until  at  last  it  ended  in 
that  vast  sea  whither  all  human  life  flows.  Others  who  have 
been  intimately  associated  with  him  in  the  important  legis 
lation  of  the  last  fifteen  years,  and  who  can  more  clearly  point 
out  the  guiding  and  restraining  influence  of  his  mind  upon 
that  legislation,  have  spoken  in  language  of  full  appreciation. 

But  I  cannot  fail  to  render  my  tribute  of  admiration  for  the 
inflexible  spirit  of  independence  that  he  always  displayed  in 
maintaining  what  he  believed  to  be  right,  refusing  to  be 
swayed  by  popular  outcry  or  the  fear  of  party  displeasure. 


80  REMARKS    OF   MR.    HALE    ON 

And  this,  joined  with  the  absence  of  any  overweening  desire 
to  enforce  views  simply  as  his  own  views,  thus  preventing  him 
from  becoming  an  "  impracticable  "  in  politics,  made  him  what 
seems  to  me  as  the  nearly  complete  pattern  of  an  American 
legislator.  His  steadfastness  in  adhering  to  a  given  course 
when  both  wind  and  tide  were  against  him,  was  shown  most 
conspicuously  in  the  impeachment  trial.  But  I  have  studied 
his  life  before  that  event  closely  enough  to  see  that  any  one 
well  knowing  him  need  not  take  that  instance  into  the  account  in 
concluding  that  Mr.  Fessenden  would  not  be  turned  from  the 
way  he  believed  to  be  the  right  way  by  fear  of  immediate  un 
popularity.  No  tempest  of  voices  ever  dictated  to  him  who 
should  be  released  to  the  people  and  who  should  be  crucified. 
But  he  who  believes  that  this  firmness  came  from  a  defiant  and 
unsympathetic  spirit  is,  I  think,  wholly  wrong.  Mr.  Fessen 
den  understood  fully,  and  talked  freely  with  his  friends  of  the 
burdens  and  restraints  imposed  by  a  political  life,  and  he 
always  strove  so  to  bear  himself  that  no  reproach  of  neglected 
duty  could  be  laid  at  his  door,  and  that  his  acts  and  his 
motives  should  not  be  cheapened  by  the  inducements  that 
beset  the  politician.  He  has  portrayed  all  this  in  his  eulogy 
upon  the  Honorable  Solomon  Foot,  a  Senator  from  Vermont, 
who  died  in  I860,  and  whom  he  respected  and  loved. 
From  his  place  in  the  Senate  Chamber  he  then  said : 

"  When,  Mr.  President,  a  man,  however  eminent  in  other  pursuits,  and 
whatever  claims  he  may  have  to  public  confidence,  becomes  a  member  of 
this  body,  he  has  much  to  learn  and  much  to  endure.  Little  does  he  know 
of  what  he  will  have  to  encounter.  He  may  be  well  read  in  public  affairs, 
but  he  is  unaware  of  the  difficulties  which  must  attend  and  embarrass  every 
effort  to  render  what  he  may  know  available  and  useful.  He  may  be  up 
right  in  purpose  and  strong  in  the  belief  of  his  own  integrity,  but  he  cannot 
even  dream  of  the  ordeal  to  which  he  cannot  fail  to  be  exposed ;  of  how 
much  courage  he  must  possess  to  resist  the  temptations  which  daily  beset 
him ;  of  that  sensitive  shrinking  from  undeserved  censure  which  he  must 
learn  to  control ;  of  the  ever-recurring  contest  between  a  natural  desire  for 
public  approbation  and  a  sense  of  public  duty ;  of  the  load  of  injustice  he 
must  be  content  to  bear  even  from  those  who  should  be  his  friends;  the 
imputations  on  his  motives;  the  sneers  and  sarcasms  of  ignorance  and 
malice;  all  the  manifold  injuries  which  partisan  or  private  malignity,  dis- 


WILLIAM    PIT  TFESSENDEN.  §1 

appointed  of  its  object,  may  shower  upon  his  unprotected  head.  All  this,  if 
he  would  retain  his  integrity,  he  must  learn  to  bear  unmoved,  and  walk 
steadily  onward  in  the  path  of  public  duty,  sustained  only  by  the  reflection 
that  time  may  do  him  justice;  or,  if  not,  that  his  individual  hopes  and 
aspirations,  and  even  his  name  among  men,  should  be  of  little  account  to 
him  when  weighed  in  the  balance  against  the  welfare  of  a  people  of  whose 
destiny  he  is  a  constituted  guardian  and  defender." 

As  I  read  these  words  the  form  of  the  dead  statesman  rises 
before  me ;  I  behold  him  in  his  place  in  the  Senate  Chamber, 
presenting  the  matured  result  of  his  thought  and  investiga 
tion,  or  casting  his  vote  uninfluenced  by  any  consideration 
whether  he  was  for  the  time  in  the  majority  or  minority;  or 
again  I  listen  to  his  voice  when,  besieged  by  importunate 
supplicants  for  political  influence  or  political  place,  his  stern 
rebuke  broke  down  the  brazen  front  of  the  man  who  sought  to 
put  his  own  advancement  higher  than  the  good  of  the  public 
service ;  and  when  I  interpret  this  loftiness  by  the  light  of  the 
words  that  he  uttered  at  the  grave  of  the  friend  whom  he  loved, 
I  know  that  he  was  not  just  because  his  nature  was  cold,  and 
that  he  did  not  hate  demagogues  because  he  had  no  sympathy 
with  the  people,  but  that  his  ideal  of  the  Senator  was  so  high, 
'and  he  so  loyally  strove  to  reach  it,  that  his  course  carried  him 
over  all  the  pain  and  heartsickuess  which  he  often  felt  when  the 
people  murmured  and  friends  grew  estranged. 

But  he  went  in  quest  of  no  popularity  that  had  to  be  bought 
by  time-serving,  and  never  kept  himself  before  the  people  by 
eccentric  courses  and  dangerous  experiments  in  legislation.  It 
was  not  of  such  as  he  that  Dryden  wrote — 

"  A  daring  pilot  in  extremity ; 

Pleased  with  the  danger,  when  the  waves  went  high 
He  sought  the  storm,  but  for  a  calm  unfit 
Would  steer  too  nigh  the  sands  to  boast  his  wit." 

He  had  no  such  ambition  for  leadership  that  for  its  sake  he 
would  bring  the  Eepublic  nigh  to  final  shipwreck. 

Mr.  Speaker,  our  own  State  mourns  an  honored  son  and  the 
nation  has  lost  a  tried  and  faithful  public  servant.  Those  who 
have  for  years  taken  part  in  our  national  Government  will  miss 


11 


82  HEM  AUKS    OF    Mil.    HALE. 

the  leader  who  was  yet  the  comrade  in  this,  that  he  took  upon 
himself  his  full  share  of  the  burden  and  work  of  the  day. 

But  to  the  young  men  who  are  just  entering  public  life  the 
deprivation  is  even  greater.  That  life  with  its  temptations  and 
seduceinents  is  all  before  us.  There  are  tricks  and  shams  and 
intimidations  that  are  set  as  pitfalls  in  our  paths.  With  much 
that  is  noble  and  inspiring  about  us,  there  are  manifold  incli 
nations  to  sloth,  to  fickleness,  and  it  may  be  to  corruption. 
Who  can  tell  whether  he  has  not  already  set  his  feet  in  the  way 
that  leads  down  to  moral  death  ?  We  need  the  tones  of  that 
voice  which  never  directed  the  coward's  retreat,  the  splendid 
calm  of  that  clear  face  that  kept  its  serenity  when  the  battle 
around  him  was  at  its  thickest ;  we  need  the  actual  sight  of 
and  association  with  him  and  all  such  as  he  was,  who  by  exam 
ple  and  precept  elevate  our  aims,  establish  our  character,  and 
make  us  truly  public  servants  for  the  public  good.  And  for 
him  who,  connected  with  public  affairs,  seeks  to  build  up  an 
honorable  reputation,  what  better  course  can  be  given  than  to 
emulate  the  steadfastness,  the  sobriety,  the  justice  of  William 
Pitt  Fessenden  ? 

The  resolutions  were  unanimously  agreed  to. 


14  DAY  USE 

RETURN  TO  DESK  FROM  WHICH  BORROWED 

LOAN  DEPT. 

This  book  is  due  on  the  last  date  stamped  below,  or 

on  the  date  to  which  renewed. 
Renewed  books  are  subject  to  immediate  recall. 


*28Sep>57p-j 

L  *  r~  i  .   J_)    1    ^ 

SFP  1  A  1QK7 

wtr  141  KID  I 

MAY  0  7  200! 

p 

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Berkeley 

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